


Nesting Birds

by TheDragonHunter



Series: Owls, Eagle-owls, Ravens [1]
Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Anxiety, But Dante's Definitely The Son Here, Canon-Typical Violence, Dysfunctional Family, Family Feels, Family Issues, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Memories, Uncle-Nephew Relationship, especially in our happiness, i guess?, look where i come from we like our sadness everywhere, so i might be having troubles telling these two apart
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-18
Updated: 2020-10-23
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:09:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 21,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26525749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDragonHunter/pseuds/TheDragonHunter
Summary: Nero might not be the most well-bred person out there (he's been living with Dante his whole life, so, duh), but he's smart enough to know when he's overstayed his welcome. In other words, if Dante wants him out of the shop, then fine, Nero will get himself out.It's not like he cares, anyway.---Or, the one in which Dante's got some sick parenting skills, Nero's had more than enough of his shit, and Patty stole their only brain cell for safekeeping, while Trish and Lady watch them all go from the sideline, with a full bucket of popcorn.
Relationships: Dante & Lady (Devil May Cry), Dante & Nero (Devil May Cry), Dante & Trish (Devil May Cry), Patty Lowell & Nero
Series: Owls, Eagle-owls, Ravens [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2195673
Comments: 11
Kudos: 82





	1. A Special Arrangement Of Blood Vessels Cools The Blood Going Out To The Feet, So Even When Standing On Ice, Birds Don’t Lose Too Much Heat

**Author's Note:**

> Sooo :D I've been replaying DMC 5 recently and damn, this game is way more awesome than I remembered (partly because I did my first playthrough on keyboard which was like, one of the worst decisions I've ever made), and the funny thing is, I can't quite get rid of this universe ever since - so I've decided I might just as well write something for it.
> 
> Some intruductory remarks, if I may: it'll be a rather small, self - contained story, nothing grand by any means. It's also going to contain quite a few headcanons, since it's about demons, and boy, demons are something I've been taught about since I was a wee babe, listening to old fairytales; I'll make sure not to make changes too invasive, though, and I'll try to adress at least some of them, to explain where I'm coming from. Lastly, I'll be going for weekly updates with this, which basically means that I surely won't be adding more than one chapter a week, though it might be less than that; I'm just not a very fast writer, okay xd

RIIIIIING!

A mop of white hair peeks from underneath the pillow, limbs flailing helplessly, until Nero finally manages to grab his phone and bring it closer to his face, squinting at the outrageously bright screen.

6.20

_Oh, for fuck’s sake._

He hits the snooze button and buries himself in the sheets.

***

RIIIIIING!

Nero tries to locate his seven times damned phone without unwrapping the cosy cocoon of his quilt. He manages, to his own surprise, and, after taking a deep breath, checks the hour.

6.40

He groans and hits the snooze button.

_Just five more minutes._

***

Nero opens one eye.

_It’s quiet._

Nero opens the other eye.

_It’s way too damn quiet._

Trying to blink away sleep, he frantically searches for the phone, lost somewhere in the chaos of his covers, to finally find it under the bed, resting safely on a small pile of dust.

7.54

_Shit_

He jumps out of his nest, grabbing jeans from the floor, _shitshitshit, I can’t believe I did it again,_ stumbles across the room, tangled in his own t-shirt, misses the door entirely, frees himself from the clothing, misses the door again, corrects his course, manages to get out of the room, rushes down the corridor, ignores the stairs in favour of swinging himself over the balustrade and onto the first floor, slaloms through the office, completely ignoring Dante, peacefully asleep in his chair, storms into the kitchen, opens the fridge and stops abruptly, staring into it’s white, vast emptiness, filled only with one, miserable, slightly mouldy cucumber.

_Kill me._

Nero grits his teeth so hard, he feels his joints cracking dangerously.

"Dante!" 

Dante, who’s either finishing his last nap from yesterday, or starting his first nap for today (or doing both simultaneously, which honestly, seems to be the most possible option), lets out a low grunt from underneath his magazine.

"Did ya do the groceries yesterday?" 

The only answer is silence, and then a very, very soft snore. Nero sticks his head into the office, fury in his eyes.

"DANTE!" 

That finally jolts him awake, all four legs of his chair meeting the ground with a loud thud, the magazine falling to the ground, as Dante tries to reconnect with the reality. He notices Nero, fuming at the doorstep, and grins cheerfully.

"Where’s the fire, son?" 

Nero is forced to use all his self - control not to throw the fridge at him.

"There is no food in this shithole _again,"_ he seethes, "You had one, _just one_ fucking job, for fuck’s sake, how hard can it be to remember?" 

Before Dante can open his mouth and make things any worse, the door to the office fly open and a petite woman steps in, with a gun in one hand and a croissant in the other.

"DANTE, YOU LAZY SON OF A… oh." Her eyes fall on Nero, still on the verge of explosion, and Dante, looking at her like she is the holy saviour, sent from the heavens to rescue him. "You’re awake," she mutters, putting the gun back into the holster "that’s good." She’s clearly regaining her composure, because her eyes narrow dangerously. "I just came here to thank you for ditching me out yesterday… Hey!" 

Nero makes the best out of the distraction Dante provides, and snatches the croissant from Lady’s hand, holding it way out of her reach and trying to maneuver himself out of the office, grabbing the backpack on his way out.

"C’mon Lady, I’m late for school already, give me a break…" 

Lady scoffs, still effectively preventing Nero from running away with her precious pastry.

"Don’t you have your own food?" 

"Matter of fact, I don’t, because _someone_ was obviously too busy to go to the supermarket yesterday. I wonder what he was up to the whole time." 

Lady freezes, her attention back to Dante, who mouths a voiceless ‘traitor’ at Nero. He just shrugs, smiling smugly.

"Remember about the meeting at school today," he chirps over Lady’s head, one foot already out of the office.

He slams the door shut, relishing in the glorious scream coming from the inside, and runs to school, trying not to choke on the croissant and failing only a little bit.

***

Nero groans, throwing himself at the bed.

"And of course, he forgot. He _fucking forgot."_

Patty looks at him from the closet she’s currently rummaging through.

"Forgot about what?" She frowns visibly. "And who forgot, anyway?" 

Nero throws his hands in the air, exasperated.

"Dante was supposed to go to this whole parent – teacher conference, and, who would have guessed, he didn’t. Which means I’m gonna have yet another ‘serious talk’ about my supposed complicated situation at home, my safety, happiness and all that shit." 

Jonathan chuckles lightly by Nero’s side, though it sounds more like he’s wheezing. His voice is a verbal equivalent of a nose, that’s been broken at least five times, and each of those times, it mended badly; it’s kind of like he’s been fed shattered glass most of his life and still cannot get all the shards out of his throat.

"There’s obviously no happiness in you whatsoever, so they can cross at least one point out of the list. Patty, are you looking for Narnia, or what?" 

Patty shoots him a glare and buries herself even further in the endless pit of her wardrobe.

"I’m looking for my pink, frilly dress," she whines, a bit muffled by like, twenty pink, frilly dresses she’s already discarded, "it’s not at my mom’s, so I must have left it here and I’m absolutely going to need it on our trip…" She looks over to Jonathan and Nero and huffs, crossing her arms. "You could be gentlemen and help me, instead of just sitting there and making fun of a lady’s misfortune." 

Nero rolls his eyes.

"Ya ain’t no lady, and we ain’t no gentlemen." That earns him another death glare, so he adds quickly, "Besides, I’d probably just mess your clothes, and that’s something we’d all like to avoid." 

Patty, though not entirely happy, decides to settle for this excuse. Nero breathes out in relief and takes a chip from a package Jonathan offers him.

When he thinks about all the ways the universe apparently hates him, the fact that he has any friends at all seems to be a result of some divine intervention, especially since this eclectic group consists of an overly – popular girl, who at some point of her life had no other choice but to befriend him, and a most-definitely-at-least-a-part-demon, who apparently has nothing better to do than to hang around every now and then. And though he might never admit it, Nero is grateful to have them, even if Patty’s very much, well, _Patty,_ and Jonathan is something… _off._ Like, he seems human, all right, but damn, does he feels so wrong sometimes, as in, ‘something’s under my bed and it sure as Hell ain’t nothing good’ kind of wrong, from those hungry eyes of his, up to the fact, that he doesn’t even smell like a living thing at all. Whatever demon made him, it must have been royally fuckin’ weird.

Patty sighs in resignation and sits on the floor, crossed-legged.

"I give up. I have no idea where it is." She crawls across the room and worms herself between Nero and Jonathan, a look of utter exhaustion on her face. "You know, I still can’t believe that I won’t be here to organize your birthday party this year." 

Jonathan rolls his eyes.

"Now, ain’t that a tragedy." 

Patty elbows him harshly.

"It’s not like you’ve ever been to any of my parties." She pouts, but Jonathan just shrugs.

"It’s not like I need to be there to know what they’re like, and trust me, it’s not my type of fun. Besides, I doubt Dante would be very happy to see me, and I should be heading back to New York anyway. My sister’s planned some family vacation and she’ll murder me in my sleep if I miss that."

"Honestly? I’m not sure if I’m gonna throw a party at all this year," Nero says suddenly.

Patty gasps by his side, jumping up and launching a small fountain of chips into the air.

"What do you mean, you’re not gonna…" 

"I mean that I’m going to move out." 

Though it seems impossible, Patty is left speechless. Jonathan shakes his head, chuckling incredulously.

"Hold it, Big N, are you really throwing that big of a tantrum over a missed meeting and some groceries?" 

"I’m not throwing a tantrum," Nero answers sharply, getting more certain about his decision with every second, "I’m gonna be fifteen, right? As good an age to leave as any other, it’s not like I can’t take care of myself. It’ll be better for everyone." 

"That’s the single most ridiculous idea you’ve ever had," Patty says firmly.

"Well, remember that one time he tried to grow wings, and he…" 

"That’s not the point! Seriously, Nero, what on earth makes you think Dante would ever agree on you just going to live on your own?" 

"That’s the thing, Patty!" Nero sits on the bed, trying to remain calm. "Dante doesn’t _care_ if I’m around or not. Oh, shut it," he cuts her off, as she opens her mouth to protest, "it’s not just about the groceries or about the school, he’s never really wanted me here and ever since you left to live with your mom last year, it’s like he can’t wait for me to get the Hell out of his place as well. He’s not home more often than he is, he hardly ever tells me when he’s coming back, honestly, he hardly ever talks to me at all. He’s just tired of me bothering him, that’s what it is."

Patty huffs irritably.

"This is ridiculous," she says again, glaring at Jonathan, "back me up, would you?" 

Jonathan shakes his head.

"I’m really not qualified for this." Patty’s glare intensifies, but he just smiles and stretches on the bed. "What? My dad was always making it pretty clear when he didn’t want me around, which was like, all the time, how would that make me an expert on whether or not Dante is subtly kicking Nero out?" 

"He’s not kicking Nero out, for crying out loud!" Patty seems to have a hard time believing she’s really having that conversation. "Nero, drop it. I mean it, just… just drop this whole idea, okay? Or at least wait until I come back from the trip with my mom before you do anything stupid." 

Nero turns away from her, but she grabs his hand and forces him to look her in the eye.

"Promise me, you won’t do anything silly while I’m gone." 

Nero rolls his eyes.

"Yeah, I promise." 

Patty kisses him on the cheek, which causes Nero to turn slightly pink, and jumps down from the bed.

"Now, you can do one gentlemanly thing today, and walk me home." 

***

Dante’s not there when Nero comes back.

_Of course he’s not._

He sighs and throws himself onto the couch, turning on the TV and trying to process all of his afternoon.

Nero’s not some spoiled brat, who demands to be in the centre of the world’s attention at all times, he’s really not. And it’s not like he’s not grateful for the fact that Dante’s been taking care of him for the last thirteen years or so, because he is. But then again, that’s perhaps what makes him want to leave more than anything, because he’s been feeling he’s overstayed his welcome for quite some time now and being a bother is the last thing he wants.

Nero’s not sure when he realised that his uncle might not be all that happy about having a kid thrown at him, but it was probably thanks to the Toothbrush Incident. He was six or seven back then, still struggling to fit in the new school (a task in which he never truly succeeded), and he’s been granted an honour of being casted for the main role in an epic play about oral hygiene. It seemed like the most amazing thing that could ever happen to him – he still remembers repeating his part for hours on end, until everyone around him knew it by heart, including Morrison, a nice lady from the local shop and the mailman, practicing his special, toothbrush dance every time he was brushing his own teeth (and being late for school for a solid month because of that), and even getting Dante to help him make the single most awesome toothbrush costume to ever grace the earth (and Hell, most likely, unless demons throw some cranky as fuck, oral-hygiene-themed orgies or something. It’s not something one should put beyond them so easily.). By the end of the month, Nero basically became an overly – excited, little, walking toothbrush, ready to rock the stage and leave the audience at awe with his toothbrush choreography, toothbrush songs and the moving, carefully prepared toothbrush speech. The only thing more important than becoming the best teeth – washing device ever, was making sure Dante would drag his sorry ass to watch him become the new theatre star, which included forcing him to memorise the whole note about the play he brought from school, reminding him about it every time they parted for longer than five minutes and leaving small, paper toothbrushes all over the shop (which they keep finding in the most impossible places to this day).

And then, he remembers coming back home with Lady, trying his best not to be the most pathetic toothbrush in the world, and explaining to her, that he always gets a runny nose when he’s out in cold.

(Dante overslept, or at least that’s what he said. And it earned Nero a trip to the funfair, so it didn’t end that bad at all, he most definitely doesn’t go reliving his short days of toothbrush glory every now and then.)

It’s been a pattern ever since, everything was always going fun and peachy, until Dante did something to remind Nero, that he’d much rather just have pizza or a nap than keep dealing with his shit. That’s what Dante does, he just forgets, he misses, he doesn’t care about anything in particular, creating a long, long list of memories in which Nero had to wait at school for hours, because he forgot to pick him up, or those in which Nero woke up from a nightmare to an empty shop, with Dante nowhere to be found, or in which he’d come back home after disappearing without a word for a week, reeking of blood, or booze, or both, and collapse on the couch, with little Nero curled up by his side, terrified, that if he falls asleep, he might miss the moment Dante’s chest stops rising (he will never admit it to anyone, but he does it still, even if the couch has long since gotten way too small for both of them, he just can’t, _can’t_ _help it_ ).

And it’s fine, really, it’s not like Nero can’t manage on his own. It’s fine.

Nero jolts, as the doors fly open with a loud whump, and a large pile of shopping bags comes tumbling in, a tower of pizza boxes on its top swaying dangerously. The pile huffs irritably.

"I’m good, I could most definitely not use any help at all." 

Nero smiles smugly.

"Yeah, I figured you’re doing great." 

Dante growls, but manages to dump the groceries safely onto the desk, where they gracefully spill out of the bags, creating a picturesque, baroque still life, with the pizza boxes still miraculously intact. Dante grins, beaming with pride ad gestures at the mess behind his back.

"Looks like food’s back on the menu!" 

Nero rolls his eyes.

"Ya robbed the shop, or what?" 

"Nah, I managed to salvage some cash from Lady. She never checks the laundry basket." He throws one pizza box to Nero and splays himself on the couch next to him, swinging his legs over the armrest. Nero chuckles lightly.

"Wonder why that is." He opens the box and raises an eyebrow. "Olives?" 

Dante shrugs, completely absorbed by the black and white cartoon.

"Got a coupon for these in the shop, figured I might just as well use it and take ‘em off. Cheaper pizza’s better pizza." 

Oh. Right.

Nero takes a bite, relishing in the salty taste of olives on his tongue. Dante’s picking at his own piece absently.

He should tell him.

Nero swallows loudly, the hot cheese suddenly a hard lump in his throat.

"Dante?" 

He doesn’t look away from the screen.

"Yeah?" 

It’s harder than Nero’s expected. He takes a deep breath.

In for a penny, in for a pound.

"I wanna move." 

Dante freezes for a split second, a small chunk of an olive slipping out of his fingers.

"I ain’t sure taking over Patty’s room while she’s out of town is all that good an idea, ya know…" 

"I mean, I wanna leave," Nero cuts in, "like, leave the house. For good." 

Dante still doesn’t move, eyes trained on the TV.

"And to go where?" There’s acid in his voice, but Nero’s not gonna be swayed that easily.

"Dunno yet. C’mon, I can make my own cash, ya don’t need to worry ‘bout that. I’ll manage." 

Dante turns to him, but the room’s dark and in the blue light of the TV screen, Nero can only see the corners of his mouth, lifted in a flippant smile.

"Look, kid, if that’s another part of your ‘I’m hungry, I’m angry’ thing, there’s plenty of food that is, sadly, not pizza, just over there, so…" 

But Nero can already feel anger building up in his chest.

"It’s not. About. The fucking. Food," he growls through gritted teeth, "I wanna leave, okay? That’s all." 

There’s silence after that, interrupted only by the cheerful, cartoonish soundtrack.

"You’re fifteen, kid." Dante’s voice is so soft all of the sudden, it takes Nero slightly aback. "There’s no way you’re gonna… Fuck, what about the school, huh? The collage, all that stuff?" 

Nero laughs, even if there’s some bitterness to it.

"We’re having the power cut off every month, so it’s not like we could ever afford it in the first place. Besides, I don’t need no college to be a devil hunter, right?" Dante opens his mouth, but Nero’s faster. "It’s no biggie, really, I’ll finish this year at school, get some fake ID and leave after my birthday, if they ask any questions, you can always say I just ran away. Ain’t that much of a problem in it for ya, trust me." 

Dante turns back to the TV.

"It’s not about…," but then he just shakes his head and grins, like he’s just decided to drop the act and stop pretending he actually minds Nero going to live on his own, instead reaching out to ruffle his hair. "My, my, look how all big and grown you are! Never thought I’d live to see the day you fly away from this gorgeous fuckin’ nest, now, if that ain’t a thing to celebrate, then I don’t know what is." 

Nero glances at him in surprise at this sudden change of attitude, but Dante’s already half – way to the kitchen, and when he emerges, holding a bottle of Jack Daniels in one hand and a can of coke in the other, he seems to be radiating glee. He throws the can at Nero and sits back, raising his bottle in a toast.

"To the new beginnings!" He chuckles, taking a generous swing. "Damn, I got a feeling Lady’s gonna kick my ass for that one." 

Nero raises his own can to him and takes a sip, bubbles filling a brand new, empty space, somewhere in his stomach.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> About the timeline for this: as a general rule, I have a very special relationship with most fictional universes, like, somewhere in the process of comprehending them, I tend to place a headcanon here and there, mix some things up and completly ignore some others, and I'm genuinely surprised every single time it turns out, that what I think is 'canon' is actually very much not canon. Usually, the part that suffers the most in this process is the general timeline, and the DMC-verse is no different - since I've played the first three games consecutively, my brain kind of squeezed all the events there into a very short period of time, so for me, it's kind of like '3>1>2>a very, very long gap>4>5'. Now, I know it's not correct according to the official info, but it's an AU anyway, so let's not be too orthodox about that. To avoid any confusion: this fic is set a couple of years after the events of the first DMC, though the first DMC happened like, a year, maybe? after the third one, and the entire mess of the second and the fourth game has not played out, or at least, not yet. In my defense, DMC's not the most consistent universe when it comes to anything, really, so come on, it's free real estate.
> 
> Also, sorry for my English, I know it sucks, but I'm doing my best, promise xd
> 
> That'll be all for now. Feel free to leave a comment if you enjoyed, even more free to leave a comment if you hated it, or to leave a kudo, if you don't want to comment. Or don't leave anything, my friend, I wish you all the best and hope you'll have a wonderful day!


	2. Young Hoatzins Are Born With Claws On Their Wings

Nero can’t sleep.

He huffs, turning in his bed for the hundredth time and stares at the ceiling.

It’s stupid, really. Like, moving out was his own idea, right? He’s got nothing to be unhappy about, but there’s still this feeling in him, like when you’re rushing the stairs and you miss the step.

When he was younger, maybe eight or nine, he had this phase, when he kept coming up with the most ridiculous ideas.

Baking a cake at two thirty in the morning.

Going to school, dressed like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle.

Eating chilli peppers only for the entire week.

Eating nothing at all for the entire week.

Building a pillow fort, but using Devil Arms instead of pillows.

Each of those times, a small part of him, hidden somewhere deep, kind of expected Dante to protest, but he never did, not even once – he went along with every idiotic plan Nero conjured, and after some time, Nero simply came to a conclusion, that he should stop them for his own good.

Yeah, it is that feeling all over again, like when he arrived to the class in his TMNT costume and realised, that what seemed like an excellent idea in the beginning might actually not be all that good. The thing is though, while back then he could just rush to the bathroom and change into something normal before anyone noticed, this time, after seeing how overjoyed Dante was with the prospect of having his whole life to himself again, Nero would rather impale himself on the Rebellion, than admit, that he’s got some second thoughts.

It’s not like he’s got so many of those, anyway, he just didn’t expect it to go so smoothly, that’s all. He’s gonna move somewhere nice and he’s gonna do a magnificent job living on his own, because, c’mon, if Dante can manage, anyone can. Lady’s probably going to lose her shit when she finds out, but it’s nothing he can’t deal with.

For now though, Nero still can’t sleep.

He sits up with a sigh, running a hand through his hair in frustration; the TV’s still buzzing downstairs, and he decides he might as well go turn it off, since Dante’s probably fallen asleep in front of it again. Pushing away the covers, Nero sets his feet on the cold floor with a quiet tap and totters down the corridor.

To his surprise, Dante’s awake, watching some dumb show with a half – empty bottle of Jack in his hand. As Nero moves to the couch, he notices one or two more, dried out and discarded on the floor, and something heavy settles in his stomach.

If that ain’t a thing to celebrate, indeed.

He plops down on the plush seat next to Dante, whose eyes are still fixed on the screen.

“Can’t sleep?” His voice is raspy, like he’s having trouble getting words out of his throat.

“Yeah.”

“Care for a swig?” He hands him the bottle and chuckles at Nero’s frown. “Chill out, kid, one sip can’t kill ya.”

Nero catches a glimpse of ‘Say Yes To The Dress’ out of the corner of his eye and shrugs.

“Why not.” He grabs the bottle and takes a shot. Whiskey burns his throat and Nero coughs, tears in his eyes. Dante grins at him, rescuing the bottle from his hands.

“You’ll get used to it.”

Now, that’s something Nero’s most definitely not planning on doing any time soon, but he says nothing, settling for watching the parade of sparkly, pearly, lacy and puffy wedding dresses on the screen. Dante’s quiet next to him, slouched on the couch with his feet on the coffee table, his eyes trained numbly on the screen, and Nero can feel some weird anxiety building up in his chest, an annoying itch, like something is wrong, but he can’t quite put his finger on it. His leg starts twitching.

“You wanna spar?” he blurts out, words rolling off his tongue before he has any chance to consider them.

Dante looks at him from the couch. There’s something strange in his eyes, but it’s gone way too soon for Nero to make anything out of it.

“Sure, kid,” he sits up and stretches, his joints cracking, “grab your sticks and stones and let’s go break some bones.”

Nero rolls his eyes.

“Ya know, old man, every time you open your mouth, I just wanna smack you.”

Dante snickers softly.

“Yeah, it’s a common reaction,” he gets up, clapping Nero on the shoulder on his way out, “I’ll meet ya in the back.”

Nero glances at him in slight confusion, but then shakes it off and rushes to the storeroom, where they keep the Devil Arms.

The Grim welcomes him with a pleased murmur as soon as he enters, but Nero ignores him, making a beeline for Agni and Rudra.

“Sorry, pal, but I doubt the neighbourhood would appreciate the Devil’s Trill Sonata at three AM.”

The violin lets out an annoyed crescendo. Nero scoffs, amused, but hesitates, his hand hovering inches from the twin swords, and glances at the exasperated arm.

“Fine,” he says finally, “but if I hear one sound from you, I promise, I’ll use your strings as shoelaces.”

He can feel the Grim’s reluctant consent at the back of his mind and as soon, as he picks the instrument up from the wall, it turns into a long, bone – made scythe, with a strange – looking handle, its blade so dark, it seems to be absorbing the light. Nero feels the humming under his fingers, but the arm remains silent.

“Now, that’s better.”

Dante raises an eyebrow at him when Nero approaches with the scythe at his side.

“Someone’s planning on becoming the world’s worst neighbour,” he shakes his head with a quiet laugh, the Rebellion materializing in his hand, “can’t say I don’t respect that.”

“He’s gonna behave, ain’t ya, ‘lil fella?” The Grim sends an unpleasant buzz through Nero’s arm, but makes no audible sound. “See? I got this.”

Dante stalks closer, swinging circles with his sword.

“Well then, boy. Show me what you got.”

Nero gives him an unimpressed look, and just as Dante opens his mouth again, he goes from absolute stillness into a rapid, swift swing at his legs. The Grim hisses in his hands, as Nero puts all of this restless unease into the motion, a single, low note vibrating in the cool air like a growl.

“Hush now,” he whispers into the bony handle, and the scythe murmurs irritably in response.

Dante dodges, but barely, staggering back with a surprised chuckle.

“Damn, kid, when did ya get so good?”

Nero tilts his head, eyes narrowed slightly.

“Somewhere between the Jacks, I guess.”

Dante chuckles some more.

“Fair enough.”

Nero takes another swing and this time Dante parries, swaying a little, as the Rebellion meets with the Grim in a shower of sparks. Dante grins cheekily.

“Still not the best, though.”

Nero growls, backing off quickly to put some distance between them, spinning a circle with the scythe.

“Oh, shut up.”

He lunges forward, using the momentum to deliver the blow from above his head, slicing through the air with enough force to break bones; Dante moves out of the way with practised ease, stepping aside a split second before the blade meets his collar bone. Grim’s weight drags Nero forward, and he feels rather than sees the Rebellion going for his stomach, so he jumps up, making a somersault in the air and landing into a crouch, just in time to parry another hit with the scythe’s handle. Bony keys rattle, as Grim lets out a few frustrated notes before Nero silences him again with an upward swing, only a tiniest little bit more sloppy than it could be, half – heartedly hoping, that Dante’s not drunk enough to end up with his guts on the ground.

There’s a sound of ripping material and Dante curses quietly. Nero stands up, pushing his hair away from his eyes, only to see his uncle leaning against the wall with a hand to his stomach, blood leaking through his fingers. He feels his own heart skipping a bit, as Grim murmurs softly against his skin and Dante pulls himself upright, revealing an ugly gash across his torso, already patching itself up. He gasps for air, his breath a little wheezy.

“I kind of liked this shirt.”

Nero smiles, resting the scythe against his shoulder.

“You’re getting slow, old man.”

Dante sneers at him, sparks cracking on his skin, a low rumble vibrating in his chest, like a distant thunder.

“Slow, huh?”

He dashes forward, Rebellion leaving a gleaming trail behind him, as he launches himself into the air and falls with a pirouette, and Nero struggles to parry the blow. When Grim clashes with the sword, Nero feels the sheer force of the strike rattling his own bones and sending needles of pain through his right arm, the wrist becoming unpleasantly numb; he manages to hold it, though, allowing the blade to slide down the curved edge of the scythe as he spins it into a high cut, but Dante closes the distance in a blink of an eye, Rebellion going for Nero’s throat. He backs up swiftly, swinging the scythe at Dante’s neck in return, but he just ducks underneath it effortlessly, not even bothering to follow the blade’s movement.

Oh, so he’s getting cocky.

They’re going blow for blow now, faster and faster, and Nero can’t hope to keep it up for very long; while Grim’s by no match the more vicious of the two arms, Rebellion strikes with speed the scythe cannot compete with, Dante keeps closing what little distance Nero’s managing to put between them, forcing him into the corner of the alley. His lungs are burning, his right arm feels like it’s about to break and Grim’s humming with a barely repressed organ solo that threatens to explode into the silence of the night any second now, but he keeps on fighting, fighting the Rebellion, the Grim, his own bones and muscles and he’s oh, so gonna show him, he is, he is, _he is_

Nero begins a downward strike from the right, but just as Dante goes for his exposed left side, he pirouettes out of the way, curving the swing upwards. The Grim’s buzzing, his blade shining hungrily in the dim light of the dawn, and it almost, almost reaches Dante’s hip, when Nero feels something wrapping around his ankle, and the very next second, he’s dangling upside down in the air, facing Dante’s smug smile, his arms crossed and the scythe resting against his side, as he watches Nero squirming and trashing helplessly, trying to reach his tail.

“Now, that’s fuckin’ cheating!”

Dante just tilts his head, something dark gleaming in his eyes, and Nero finds himself going completely still.

“There ain’t no such thing as cheating in fighting. Ya always gotta throw all you have at ‘em.”

Nero huffs, giving up and hanging limp like a ragdoll.

“Let me go.”

Dante grins cheekily.

“Make me.”

An angry growl escapes Nero’s throat, not a human sound at all, as he stretches out rapidly and manages to push a single key on the Grim’s handle. The scythe lets out a triumphant, soul – rattling note, and an enormous, spectral organ pipe, its tip sharpened into an arrow, falls from the sky. Dante manages to jump away, but loses his balance, causing him and Nero to tumble to the ground. Nero coughs in the cloud of dust, ringing in his ears muffling the sound of Dante’s laughter.

“Not bad, kid,” he gasps, splayed on his back next to Nero, “not bad at all.”

Nero groans, shaking his head.

“That’s so unfair,” he mumbles, “ya get to have all these fangs and claws and tails, and all I get out of being completely messed up, is the eternal fuckin’ damnation. It’s not cool, really.”

Dante just chuckles, causing Nero to pout even more.

“You’re doing just fine without any fangs and claws,” he turns his head to look at Nero, “you okay?”

The boy wiggles his right hand and winces.

“I guess,” he says, “think it’s just a little cracked. This arm’s just completely useless, I bet there’s something wrong with it.”

“Sure, it’s totally the arm’s fault.”

Nero’s eyes narrow dangerously.

“It’s not funny!” he growls, “I’ll get an upgrade, old man, you’ll see. A wee bit more power and I’ll kick your ass so hard, you’ll have to go on an epic quest to find its pieces.”

Dante’s grin gets even wider, so wide, it’s hard to believe it’s not physically painful.

“Yeah, I’d like to see that.”

They lay together in silence for a while, breathing heavily, as the beams of the rising sun paint bloody streaks in the dusty alley and it feels kind of nice, because it’s so quiet and peaceful and Dante smells like home and like safety, and this silly, small demon child in Nero wants nothing more than to curl up on his side and fall asleep.

But it is silly and Nero knows that, so instead, he pushes himself up with a groan.

“I gotta go to school.”

Dante looks at him from the ground.

“Back in my days, we had to be fighting hordes of bloodthirsty demons to get our education.” He clacks his tongue in disapproval. “Ya kids have it way too easy…”

Nero kicks a stray can at his head, but Dante manages to catch it and throw it back at Nero. He rolls his eyes and turns to leave.

“Hey, kid.”

“Yeah?”

“I’ll pick ya up today.”

Now, that’s unexpected.

“Why?”

Dante beams at him.

“Because since you’re leaving, ya gonna need a car for that.”

***

When Nero leaves the school, Dante’s already there, leaning against his Mustang and grinning at some blonde, senior girl, who’s trying to hide her blush and it’s not only very likely to be illegal, but also gross.

(The girl cannot know it though, he’d give her that. To be honest, Nero has no idea how old Dante actually is, which is pretty ridiculous, but true nevertheless (he asked him, once; Dante’s only answer was that he’d have to count, which closed the topic, really, because Dante’s got some serious problems with counting above ten), but he’s pretty sure nobody’s supposed to look nineteen for like, a decade, that’s just unfair.)

(And then again, somewhere in the back of his head Nero knows that demons don’t grow old, they don’t, they just grow up and then they grow stronger and if he’s to be completely honest, he can’t even remember Dante _aging_ – it was more like one day he decided he’s done with being a teenager and just like that, he’s looking like he’s in his mid – twenties now, in this freaky, simplified kind of way, like in the cartoons, where the only indication that a character got older is a stubble. Like he doesn’t quite know how to make himself age properly.

Anyway, Nero doesn’t complain, because c’mon, at least Dante’s decided that shirts are cool again, but he just can’t help but wonder, what actually happens when a part of you is mortal and the other part is not? Like, will he grow old himself? Does it matter, that he’s more human than Dante is? Can they die of old age? Where do demons even go when they die, and can they truly die at all? It’s not nice not to know and it’s not like he’s got anyone he could ask about that, since the only other hybrids he knows are Jonathan and Dante, and he’s pretty sure none of the two has any more answers than he’s got himself.)

Nero shakes off the unpleasant thoughts and crosses the parking lot with long strides.

“How is it that I’m the school weirdo, but you’re like, the coolest guy around whenever ya show up?”

Dante puts out a cigarette with his foot and looks down at him, a smirk tugging at the corners of his lips.

(That’s unfair, too, because no matter how tall Nero is, Dante’s still towering over him like a freaking Godzilla)

“Because I am the coolest, that’s why.” He laughs, as Nero punches his arm and stomps to the car, radiating annoyance.

Dante hops onto his seat and turns on the radio, the sounds of ‘Paradise City’ filling the small space as they leave the yard with the screech of tires, missing a group of freshmen by inches.

Dante always drives like he’s not quite sure what a driving wheel is supposed to do, but this time, it’s somehow even worse; by the time they reach the outskirts, Nero’s deeply convinced they’re either going to stop on a tree, a lamp, or on a corpse of an elderly lady. They don’t, which is a miracle in and on itself, and they reach the car dealer remotely intact.

Nero jumps out of the car, trying to fight a crushing wave of nausea, while Dante steps forward with a face of a man, who’s bringing a lost soul to the gates of heaven.

“Here we are!”

Nero looks around unenthusiastically. The place doesn’t look very impressive, but then again, it’s not like he could afford anything above the level of ‘fairly decent, won’t fall apart when starting the engine’. He follows Dante deeper into the alleys, the dealer, a chubby, middle – aged man, observing them suspiciously from the porch of his office.

“Can I help you, gentlemen?”

Dante, clearly oblivious to his negative attitude, waves at him dismissively.

“Nah, we’re good. We’ll let ya know if we find anything worthwhile in this glorious scrapyard of yours.”

The salesman huffs irritably, but probably decides they’re not worth another second of his life and returns to his newspaper. Dante stops in front of a rusty Jeep and looks at Nero.

“So, how much you got?”

Nero makes some quick calculations in his head.

“Ten hundred bucks, I think.”

Dante whistles through his teeth.

“That’s some serious cash, kiddo.”

“All I ever do is not spending all the money I get on pizza and strawberry sundaes.” Nero comes to inspect a black Impala, that is way beyond his funds, but still looks awesome “It’s not that hard.”

They stroll down the alley in silence.

“So,” Dante starts, sticking his head out of some mouldy wreck, “ya decided where ya wanna head to?”

Nero shrugs.

“Didn’t give it that much of a thought yet. I just want… “ he frowns, trying to find the right words, “I wanna move somewhere big. Somewhere noisy, ya know? See somethin’ that ain’t this shithole of a town.”

Dante huffs a laugh, joining Nero in a white Toyota. Nero looks at him curiously.

“You never wanted to move away?”

Dante stretches out on his seat, squinting at the setting sun.

“Nah, not really.” Nero looks at him incredulously and Dante shrugs. “I had my fair share of travels when I was younger and trust me, it’s as good a place for napping as any. Besides, I believe that once you find a good pizza spot, ya should hold onto it, so that’s what I do.”

Nero rolls his eyes and leans further into the plush seat.

“I like this one,” he says after a while, “it’s suspiciously cheap, though.”

Dante yawns lazily.

“If the Marshmallow Man over here sells ya some garbage, we can always come back and teach him some proper customer service.”

Nero laughs and stares at the horizon through the dirty window, the grasshoppers cricketing in the high grass behind the parking lot. The air smells of the night and of journey and of the beginning of summer.

“Yeah,” he says softly, “guess I’m just gonna move as far from here as I can.”

There’s something like a strange, choking sound to his right, and when he turns to Dante, he sees him holding a spring with a look of utter disapproval on his face.

“I think I’m starting to get just why this car is so cheap.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Grim's, Nero's weapon in this AU, is a violin, that can change into a scythe, with an ability to basically hit someone with demonic pipe organs. I don't know, it just seemed cool to me xd


	3. The Sooty Tern Takes Off Over The Ocean And Flies For At Least Three Years Without Settling On Water Or Land

Trish hates summer.

It might be due to the inevitable lack of jobs during the season, when everyone is too busy enjoying the weather to be concerned about some weird noises in the attic. Or because she’s no longer the best dressed chic around, and she must share the hungry stares with the others. Or it’s about the sun doing terrible things to her hair.

Or maybe it’s just that the heat reminds her too much of Mundus, and that’s not a very pleasant memory.

Yeah, Trish hates summer. The only thing she hates more is the fact, that Dante’s too lazy to hand-deliver her very own money back, so whenever she wants to nag him about the cash he owes her, she is forced to make it all the way to Devil May Cry.

Which is exactly what brought her to the shop on this dreadfully hot, nauseatingly sweet, drowsy Sunday afternoon.

She kicks the door open and steps inside, only to freeze on the doorstep seconds later. Something is wrong.

First thing, the chair behind the desk is empty, with no sign of sleeping Dante anywhere around.

Second thing, there’s noise coming from the kitchen.

Third thing, it smells of food, but not quite of pizza.

Trish furrows her brows and strides right to the back of the shop, where she comes to a halt yet again, completely dumbfounded.

Lady and Nero are slumped on the old couch, both with looks of utter consternation on their faces, while Dante’s vividly gesticulating, a large, wooden spoon in one hand.

“I swear to Hell Lady, just because I don’t cook much, doesn’t mean I _can’t_ cook at all…”

“It’s not that you don’t cook much,” Lady interrupts him, still obviously in shock, “it’s that the last time you even made an attempt at cooking, I still had to show my ID to buy booze. And, if I remember correctly, you ended up ordering pizza anyway.” She wrinkles her nose in disgust. “Something’s burning.”

“You just don’t want me to… Fuck!”

A loud, hissing sound, made by one of countless pots bubbling on the stove, forces Dante to return his full attention back to the task at hand. Trish sneaks into the kitchen, still somewhat confused, and plops down onto the couch next to Lady.

“Would someone care to explain what the Hell is going on here?”

Nero just shakes his head, like he has some serious problems comprehending his own words.

“Dante’s making dinner.”

Trish chokes slightly.

“He’s doing _what_ now?”

“Actually, that’s a very good question.”

Dante impales a piece of meat on his knife with a loud thud and looks at them, sniffing irritably.

“It’s a lasagne,” he narrows his eyes at Trish, “also, I don’t remember inviting any of ya, so you can just walk yourself out.”

“You owe us money,” Trish and Lady answer in unison.

Dante rolls his eyes.

“You’re the most heartless creatures I’ve ever met, ya know that? Let’s make a deal,” he points his bloody knife at them, “I’ll let ya stay, but if my lasagne appears to be the best lasagne you’ve ever eaten, which, of course it will, ya’ll both forget half of what I owe ya. Fine?”

Trish exchanges a quick glance with Lady and nods.

“Fine,” she lowers her voice slightly and asks Nero in a half-whisper, “does he have any idea what a lasagne is?”

Nero just shrugs.

“I think he has some general concept.”

“I tried to suggest he should start with something more his level,” Lady adds, a malicious gleam in her eyes, “but you know how he is about that.”

Oh, yeah, Trish knows.

( _Sometimes, when she gets some idea into her head, Lady can be the single most stubborn creature in the world._

_Sending Nero to school was one such idea and no amount of crying, growling, screaming and threatening could sway her resolve._

_“He’s got to meet other kids,” she persuaded calmly, staring at a fully triggered Dante with an unimpressed look, “learn some basics at least. Come on, he can’t spend his entire life in this shop and you know that!”_

_Dante obviously had a very different view on the matter, but Lady was adamant about getting it her way, and so, after fabricating some important papers, buying a truckload of notebooks, pens in all colours of the visible spectrum (and in some of the invisible one, most likely), Mickey Mouse-shaped rubbers, three little backpacks and the cutest lunchbox in the world, Nero was peeled off of Dante and sent on his way to education and prosperity on one foggy, September day._

_It didn’t end all that well._

_Aside from the kids being clearly aware of his demon blood, and therefore reacting with either fear or mild antipathy, Nero had huge problems with learning how to read, a thing Trish could certainly sympathize with. It never came naturally to her and even after living around humans and their scribbling for so long, she still got a headache every time she was forced to decipher anything longer than three sentences; the letters simply didn’t want to enter her mind, like they were trying to actively prevent her from understanding the message they carried._

_However, the positive outcome of this affair, for Trish at least, was the fact, that a very serious talk with Nero’s teacher Dante was forced to endure led them all to this afternoon, with Dante and Nero seated on the pool table, an old book between them, and Trish and Lady observing them from the comfort of the couch. Dante, who was probably the last person that should be teaching anyone anything even remotely connected to words (or numbers, for that matter), pointed at the yellowy pages cheerfully._

_“Reading’s not that bad, kid. See, that’s an A here, that’s a B and this one is…?”_

_“An S?”_

_Dante squinted at the book, twisting his neck to see it better, a look of uncertainty flickering through his face._

_“Yeah, sure thing it is!”_

_Lady cleared her throat._

_“You know, you could also begin your tutoring with something a little less above both of your heads than the Declaration of Independence.”_

_Dante sent her a look carrying an obvious message, that he never expected her to understand the depths of his genius._

_“I could, alright, but that would ruin my brilliant idea of using this plain, practical skill to build a firm foundation of a deep, patriotic love for our Fatherland.” He turned back to Nero, who was looking only slightly lost. “Now, ‘lil guy, ya just gotta clamp these letters together!”_

_“a… b… sol… ved… f… rom all… a l l e g i a n c e,” the boy frowned visibly, “what does it mean?”_

_“Freedom, my dude. Freedom.”)_

“You know I can still hear ya, right?” Dante’s slaughtering potatoes now, which is not a good sign, for Trish is pretty sure a lasagne needs exactly zero potatoes. Nero’s choking in the corner of the couch, which earns him an accusatory look. “I am creating unforgettable, fond memories of home cooking for ya, boy, and that’s how ya thank me. Fine. We’ll talk later, when you’re months into being oh, so independent and living on instant soups only.”

“Dante, as unforgettable as my memories of home cooking may be, they’re very, very far from being ‘fond’”

“Now, that’s just bullshit, because I can clearly remember you enjoyin’ the Hell out of my cookin’.”

“Yeah, probably because the last time ya cooked anything I was four and very much into tasteless mushes.”

Dante lifts his gaze from the potatoes, only to glare daggers at Nero.

“One more word, and you’ll be moving out sooner than you planned.”

Trish can feel the sudden change in the air, as Lady purses her lips into a thin line, but at this second, Nero’s phone rings and the sound of ‘Stayin’ alive’ prevents the threatening tirade, as Lady excuses herself to the bathroom. Nero picks up.

“Yeah?” he winces and pulls the phone slightly away from his ear, “Patty, for fuck’s sake, I’m right here, ya ain’t need to…” he perks up suddenly, “Really? Yeah, sure, just wait a second…” he makes an apologetic gesture at Trish and leaves the kitchen, his voice fading as he runs upstairs.

Trish stands up to lean against the counter, her eyes trained on Dante’s back.

“He’s not really leaving, is he?”

Dante looks at her, grinning cheerfully.

“What, ya thought s’just about playin’ a trick on Lady?”

“Well, it would be a good one, considering she’s been ranting about it for the last couple of weeks every single time she called me.”

Dante chuckles and turns back to the stove.

“Nah, it’s a real deal. He’s moving right after his birthday.”

Trish can basically feel the jarring in her own thoughts.

“And you’re so okay with that?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” he’s still not looking at her, stirring something a tad bit too vigorously, “he’s gonna be just fine and I’ll finally get to have my well deserved, week-long nap.”

Oh, she’s so not letting it go so easily.

“Dante.”

“Yeah?”

“Look at me.”

“No can do, darling, I got a feeling this shit’s about to do something weird the second I let it out of my sight, so…”

“Dante, I swear to the Great Fallen, you either look me in the eye, or this whole kitchen will do something weird.”

That finally does the trick, and Dante turns to her, rolling his eyes with an annoyed expression.

“What?”

Trish doesn’t answer right away, studying him carefully.

At first glance, he looks exactly as he did when she saw him last month, it’s just that his hair got a bit longer, but when she looks closely, she sees that he lost some weight; there’s sharpness to his face that wasn’t there before, his clavicles are somewhat more prominent and his wrists more skinny, causing him to look even more like an underfed, young hellhound than he usually does. With the loose strands of hair falling onto his eyes and this new, nervous twitch of his fingers, he makes Trish want to grab him by the collar, force to eat his veggies, drink his milk and go to sleep at nine every night; an annoying instinct she can’t quite get rid off when it comes to Dante, because while he might be a perfectly grown human being, to a demon he’s still but a cub, that’s grown its claws way too soon. 

But all in all he seems just fine, and Trish fights back a frustrated growl.

It makes no sense.

Dante shifts uncomfortably under her gaze.

“Ya done? Because I’ve still got a dinner not to burn…”

No, Trish is not done; the problem is, she doesn’t know what it is that she should do, so she just shakes her head, as Lady comes back to rant about the lack of warm water in the bathroom upstairs.

***

Trish stares at her lasagne suspiciously, and out of the corner of her eye, she can see Nero doing the same.

It looks like food.

It smells like food.

It has no right to do neither.

Lady pokes her piece with a fork, as if expecting it to come to life and bite off her face any moment now.

“Are you sure it’s edible?”

Dante rolls his eyes.

“Does it look like it’s not?”

“It doesn’t,” Nero carefully twists the tangy cheese around his fork, “that’s what worries us.” He takes a bite and chews cautiously for a moment, Trish and Lady staring at him with held breaths.

Nero swallows.

“It’s… Honestly, it’s the best lasagne I’ve ever eaten in my entire life.”

“See, I told ya!” Dante slams his fist on the table triumphantly and attacks his own piece with ferociousness of somebody who hasn’t been fed for weeks. Lady watches them with an expression of utter disbelief, until she too dares to try the dish and her face lightens up momentarily.

“Damn, it is good,” she stuffs her mouth full of the casserole and motions at Trish encouragingly, “try it, come on!”

Trish finally decides the lasagne trustworthy enough to put it on her own tongue and… well, it’s awesome. It’s hot and cheesy and tangy and salty and savoury and all the things great in the world and Trish doesn’t even regret the money Dante would never give her back anyway.

Nero wins the fight with his bit.

“When did ya learn to make it, old man?”

“S’just my natural talent.” Dante smiles smugly and dodges a napkin Lady throws at him. “What? I’m telling ya, me and Italian kitchen? We’re made for each other.”

“I hate to say that, but there might be some truth to it.”

Lady winces.

“Yeah, today we agree with Dante and tomorrow they’ll start blowing for the Judgement Day. No, thank you.”

Trish chuckles, devouring the last chunks of her lasagne. Dante leans back in his chair.

“Now, since you ladies are being so very polite today, I guess you deserve to see the awesome surprise I got for our almost-birthday-boy here”.

“For me?” Nero looks at him in confusion.

“Sure thing, kiddo!” He kicks himself up and stands behind Nero’s chair, clasping his hands on both of his shoulders. “See, as ya’ll know, our little boy here has decided it’s finally time for him to move out and go live on his own,” he sends Lady a defiant look, but she just shakes her head, as if already given up, “and, since he had such a hard time making up his mind ‘bout where to go, and I still had to get him some birthday gift, I came up with an excellent solution. Now, if I may ask ya to follow me…” he motions at them and leads their little group to the back of the shop, where he opens the door, looking awfully proud of himself.

There’s an old, yellow van, parked in the backyard. It sure as Hell has seen better days – it’s a tiny bit rusty, could use some serious cleaning and Trish’s pretty sure the air conditioning doesn’t work, considering how all the windows are open – but it seems solid enough. Then her eyes fall on the neon Devil May Cry sign on its side.

Dante runs a hand through his hair, unusually flustered.

“So, I thought, since you’re gonna be a devil hunter anyway, ya might just as well run some sort of a mobile branch of the DMC. ‘Cause, ya know, people know us, so it’ll be easier for you to…”

The rest of his sentence remains unspoken, as Nero throws himself at Dante, enclosing him in a tight hug. Something akin to shock flickers through his face, but then he grins indulgently, patting Nero on the head somewhat awkwardly.

“C’mon, kiddo, s’just a car, no biggie…”

Nero pulls away quickly and rubs his nose, the tips of his ears slightly red.

“Yeah, it’s… It’s awesome, really. Thanks, old man.”

“Glad ya like it,” Dante says, a tad bit too loud, his eyes avoiding Nero, “now, Lady, I got a tiny ‘lil favour to ask of ya…”

Lady rolls her eyes but follows him inside, Nero trailing behind them, after glancing at the van one more time. Trish watches them all with a frown.

It makes no sense, no sense at all.

When she first met Dante, she thought it impossible for him to have even a drop of demon blood in his veins – truth be told, she probably wouldn’t believe it, had she not seen him trigger right in front of her so many times, because for all his devil-may-care posing, Dante was all the things demons were not. He was kind. Compassionate. Forgiving. Gentle sometimes, in his own, limited way, he smelled of feelings that could only ever make demons hungry, not of the ones they knew themselves. It seemed like he was nothing but a human, a weird one, she’d give him that, but a human nonetheless.

Until that time, when he vanished for a few weeks, and when he returned, he came with fire and smoke and this quiet, low buzz, that spoke straight to Trish’s bones, one that promised slaughter and warned to _stay away._

She can still remember trying to convince Lady, that going anywhere near the shop might not be a good idea. She remembers failing at that, and she remembers the absolutely precious look of surprise on the hunter’s face, as she flew across the street after trying to barge into the Devil May Cry, as she always did (it is one of Trish’s most cherished memories, though she’ll never mention that to Lady). She remembers Lady freaking out, because there was _Vergil,_ once, and Dante and Vergil were _the same_ and if one of them lost it, why not the other?

She remembers how unnerving it was, for she too knew there was Vergil once, and Hell, if Vergil wasn't mad (and they say it runs in the family, don’t they?).

And then, after a few months, she remembers Dante calling Lady, saying that he was so, so sorry and asking them both to come around.

She remembers feeling a small, weak presence in the shop.

Seeing a tiny bundle of white hair and blue eyes, curled up in Dante’s arms.

The way Dante growled at her when she got to close. How he seemed to be ashamed of himself, but he just couldn’t help it, because there was a child there, and it was weak and it was young and it was _his_ , and he has always been just as much of a demon, as he was a human.

Trish understood that. Lady didn’t, but she tried to.

It was only a long time later, that Trish realised something has changed in Dante, something escaped him, though she might never know what it was.

And now, now he’s all of the sudden kicking the kid out, this young, brazen cub, that barely even knows how to bite.

Trish shakes her head and steps back into the shop.

Silly, fickle kittens, one more so than the other.

***

The funny thing is, Trish can never simply enter the Devil May Cry, deal with Dante and leave; no, there’s always something else that requires her presence, and then something else after that and she always stays for five more minutes, until it gets dark outside and she just stays the night, or a day, or a week. And this time is no different, because first Dante and Lady get into a fight, though neither she nor Nero can quite grasp what it is that they’re fighting over, then Nero wants to spar with her, because he’s got some troubles with his scythe, ever since he broke his arm playing basketball at school, and ‘Dante’s just too lazy not to go easy on him’, then Dante wants to play poker, then he loses, then he wants to play again and in the end, they all end up watching some dumb show about wedding dresses that Nero and Dante both vigorously claim to hate, until Lady dozes off in the armchair, soon followed by Dante, who splayed himself all over Nero’s space as soon as the kid went to the kitchen to grab a snack. Trish watches Lady snoring softly, her mouth slightly agape, a strange, but not unwelcome feeling of warmth in her chest, and then her eyes shift to Dante, curled up next to her.

Demons don’t sleep (they don’t die either, and Trish can’t help but wonder if there’s some connection between the two); when she first left Hell, finding out, that humans need to spend a solid part of their lifes in a state of peaceful unconsciousness was a source of utter confusion for her. Luckily, Dante provided an excellent model for her to study this phenomenon, as sleeping seemed to be his only reason for staying alive, aside from pizza and killing demons, an activity he performed with admirable devotion and one he was more than happy to show off whenever able to remain motionless for a period of time longer than thirty seconds. Soon, Trish became accustomed to all kinds of sleeping, napping and dozing off known to mankind, from this numb, idle stillness he could spend entire days in, to passing out after having one drink too much, to half-alert resting whenever they were on an especially boring gig, up to the deep, peaceful slumber she’s only ever seen on the rare occasions, when all was right in the world.

It’s not one of those occasions now; Dante sleeps like someone who’s tired with a bone-deep exhaustion, but refuses to let himself fully relax, his breaths are shallow, muscles twitching nervously every now and then, and without the usual fuss he makes around himself, without the easy grins and cheesy quips, he just seems sick.

And it makes no sense, none at all.

Trish sighs in frustration and fights back the urge to reach out and pull his hair away from his forehead, instead remembering, that she’s got a job tomorrow and that she should really leave now, if she wants to make it on time.

Just as she opens the door to the quiet, warm night outside, Nero emerges from the kitchen with a chocolate bar in his hand.

“Ya won’t be stayin’?”

“Not today, no. I’ve a gig out of town.” She’s about to say her goodbyes and leave, but damn, the kid looks so young, and they all do, and they all are, so she turns on her heel without even thinking properly about what she wants to say. “Nero…”

“Yup?”

She shakes her head and sends him a small smile.

“Look, we all have these times in our lifes when we just want to quit being associated with Dante in any way, it’s completely normal, but are you absolutely certain you want to…”

“Yeah,” he cuts her off, a look of determination on his face, “yeah, I’m sure.” He looks to the side, and adds a little quieter, “c’mon, ya saw Dante today. I want to leave and he wants me to leave, it’s all… It’s all fine.” He smiles and gives her a lazy salute, so Trish waves at him and steps out into the plain, easy dark, quietly closing the doors behind her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ^^


	4. Lighthouses Are Dangerous For Birds; The Beams Attract Them, Especially In Misty Conditions

Every single time Lady’s convinced that Dante’s reached the peak of stupidity, he proves her wrong, like that time he almost blew up the microwave, when he put a piece of pizza in a tinfoil in it, and then he really blew it up, after placing it on a metal plate instead. Or when he borrowed cash from her to buy a new ride, and then he borrowed even more cash from Trish to pay her back. Or when he brought a kid to this pestilential shop.

Or now, that he’s cheerfully letting the very same kid go Hell knows where.

Lady grinds her teeth.

She tried to talk some sense into Dante, but she could just as well try to talk some sense into a block of wood that simply refused to see the dreadful wrongness of the entire idea, no matter what arguments Lady brought up.

She then tried to talk some sense into Nero, to no avail. She’s never seen the kid being so determinate about anything, it seemed like he wouldn’t stay even if she chained him up to the wall of his own room.

In the end, after doing everything she possibly could, Lady came to a conclusion that she should just let the whole thing go, for the sake of Dante’s physical, and her own mental wellbeing.

Which doesn’t mean she’s not royally pissed and she’s not going to put some stray bullets in Dante’s head on today’s job.

It’s scorching fucking _hot_. The doors to Devil May Cry are wide open, but the second Lady walks into the shop, she nearly chokes on the stuffy, sultry air inside, the midday sun turning the office into a giantic oven.

Dante’s nowhere to be seen.

“Hey, dumbass!”

There’s a loud clatter coming from somewhere above Lady’s head, and a subtle drizzle of plaster falls from the ceiling.

“I’m in the attic!”

Huh. That’s a new one.

Lady risks an adventure into the depths of the shop, up into the mercilessly heated air, sweat dripping out of every pore on her skin, to be rewarded with a sight of Dante, covered in dust and cobweb, sitting in the middle of countless boxes, oddments and general rubbish. Lady leans against a rotten, wooden bar, careful not to touch anything.

“What the Hell are you doing?”

Dante beams at her proudly.

“I’m making a general cleaning.”

Lady raises her eyebrows in disbelief.

“You. A general cleaning. Or, any cleaning at all.”

“Yeah,” he gestures to a crooked tower of boxes under the wall, “Nero’s moving out, so I figured it might be a good idea to get rid of some of this stuff.”

“How unusually reasonable of you,” Lady scoffs and moves to sit on the floor next to him, “need a hand?”

“How unusually kind of you.” Dante eyes her suspiciously. “Ya gonna charge me for that, ain’t ya?”

Lady shrugs, bringing one of the boxes closer for inspection.

“It’s still too hot for the job, so I might as well do something while I’m here. Besides, watching you cleaning is like, a milestone in the history of mankind. I just wouldn’t want to miss that.”

Dante rolls his eyes and turns back to the trunk he’s currently rummaging through. The light falls in through the cracked window, dust floating in the still air.

Lady opens her box.

An old teddy bear, with one ear torn off and the stuffing poking through worn off seams. A couple of children’s books, that look like they’ve never been opened. A pair of tiny trousers, with holes on the knees. A thick, white envelope; when Lady takes it out, it falls apart, and a bunch of photographs spill out onto the floor. She grabs a couple of them and looks at the first one.

The adorable, tiny Nero, staring into the camera with obvious bloodthirst, written all over his face, his hair neatly braided and tied with pink ribbons.

(When Nero was little, he was absolutely adamant about not cutting his hair _ever_ ; since the only attempt at that ended up with the kid screaming bloody murder, Trish trying to get him down from the chandelier and Dante quite possibly crying in the corner, they just let him have it his way. After a lot ( _a lot_ being the key phrase here) of coaxing and pleading and making an oath of not trying to use anything even remotely sharp in the proximity of hair, Nero reluctantly allowed Dante to at least brush it. A couple of spectacular failures later, Dante set a new lifegoal for himself – namely, becoming the single best hairdresser it the Capulet City, and, to everybody’s surprise, he kind of succeeded, which, again, led to some more or less bloody accidents.

Nero only cut his hair once, when he was twelve and Patty told him, that she’d like him better like that. Apparently, she was wrong, and the kids didn’t talk to each other for a solid month.)

Next one.

Slightly older Nero, proudly demonstrating his brand-new piercing.

(When Dante heard about it, he told Nero it was a bad idea, which, obviously, was the only encouragement Nero needed to go through with it. What Dante didn’t tell him, was the fact, that due to their enhanced healing, removing said piercing required it to be torn out of the flesh that quickly grew around it. Dante might have been a bit too smug about it for a while.)

Next.

Tiny Patty, on her first day in Devil May Cry, holding Nero’s hand and grinning by his side.

( _“Dante.”_

_“Yeah?”_

_“There was only one kid in here this morning.”_

_“Yup.”_

_“And, correct me if I’m wrong, now I can see like, two of them.”_

_Dante carefully studied his surroundings, before nodding solemnly._

_Lady pinched the bridge of her nose._

_“Would you care to explain what the Hell is this?”_

_“What the Hell is what?”_

_“THIS!” she screams, waving at the little blonde, currently hanging on the cupboard, giggling like mad and trying to escape Nero’s grasp._

_“Oh! It’s a Patty.”_

_“A Pa… Dante, are just going to take in every stray kid you happen to stumble upon, or what?”_

_He just rolled his eyes and patted her on the shoulder reassuringly._

_“Chill, darling, she won’t be staying. Someone in the orphanage called me ‘bout there being some weird things happening around her, and she can’t stay with the other ‘lil ones ‘till it’s all fixed, so I figured I might just as well bring her here. Like, kids gotta be around other kids, right?”_

_Lady sighed, rubbing her temple._

_“Just a few days, huh?”_

_Dante nodded cheerfully and turned to grab the girl just before she fell from the ceiling.)_

Next.

Nero and Patty in their tiny Halloween costumes, each holding a bucket of treats the size of their whole body, sitting on the shoulders of Dante in his full Devil Trigger, all three emanating the pure pride of people who all but came, saw and conquered.

Next.

Another Nero and Patty, older this time, just before some school dance, Nero glaring daggers in his suit and Patty a beaming fluff of pink taffeta and cotton candy by his side.

Next.

Nero holding Grim firmly in his hands, standing on the dead body of the very first demon he killed, grinning like mad.

Next.

Trish, Lady, Dante, Nero and Patty squeezed on the couch, all of them in their ugliest, Christmas sweaters.

Lady puts the photos away, feeling something strange and prickly deep inside her, like a tiny piece of broken glass under the skin. She reaches deeper into the box and takes out a tiny, tiny winter jacket, with a pair of small horns on the hood and a long, highly impractical devil tail at the back. Her fingers brush gently against the soft material.

( _One of the Capulet’s many charms was it slightly uncanny ability to transform from a scorching desert into a winter wonderland within a period of time as short as a week. The general chaos it caused made the fact, that Dante remained equally bare-chested no matter the weather surprisingly comforting._

_Lady watched him sceptically, as he kept trying to dress bouncing Nero in his cute, tiny Superman sweater._

_“Don’t you think he’ll get a little cold?”_

_He just waved at her dismissively._

_“Demons don’t get cold,” he finally managed to immobilize Nero between his legs, “’sides, it’s not like I could ever manage to put anything else on him, he’s gonna like, explode, if we’re not out in five minutes.”_

_An excited squeal coming from the kid seemed to be proving his point. Dante released him, fully dressed now, and Nero immediately shot towards the door with a speed Lady was sure no human child could ever hope to replicate._

_She shuddered at the vague thought of what raising Dante and Vergil must have been like._

_Dante just chuckled and reached for his coat, not even bothering with a shirt._

_“Ya ready for your first snow, ‘lil guy?”_

_The only answer Nero was capable of giving was a pleading whimper, as he buzzed with excitement, his eyes darting from his uncle to Lady and back. Dante lifted him from the ground and placed the boy on his hip._

_“Let’s go then!”_

_Lady followed them outside, squinting in the bright sun._

_Nero was left absolutely speechless, pupils wide and his mouth slightly agape, admiring the white, frosty world all around him, small puffs of mist coming out of him with every breath. He climbed onto Dante’s shoulder to get a better view and Dante laughed, doing his best to prevent the tiny fingers from poking out his eyes._

_“Ya gotta get down to get all the fun, ya know?” he grabbed the kid and unceremoniously tossed him into a large, fluffy pile of snow._

_The snow let out a delighted thrill, as Nero dug his way out of it, trying to blink away the cold flakes, a wide grin on his face._

_“Snow!” he screamed, throwing a handful at Lady._

_“Snow!” screamed Dante, grabbing Lady and throwing her into the pile next to Nero._

_“Snow!” screamed Lady, latching herself onto Dante’s arms and pulling him onto the ground with her._

_Soon, Nero discovered everything there was to know about snow, including the process of making angels on it, a noble art of building a snowman and learning how to make super hard snowballs. It was just after an epic battle, in which Lady and Nero defeated Dante and the snowman, that Lady realised something was wrong._

_“I think he’s shivering.”_

_Dante just rolled his eyes._

_“I told ya, demons don’t…” at this exact second Nero sneezed and Dante yelped, scooping the boy up from the ground and tucking him under his coat like a tiny, sniffing kitten. He turned to Lady with a look of absolute terror on his face._

_“I broke him,” he shook his head, panic clearly creeping up to him, “shit, I fucked up, I shouldn’t have… I should’ve just…”_

_“Dante.” He looked to her, still so freaking scared, it was almost painful to look at him. “You didn’t fuck up. Well, not all that much, anyway.” She tugged on the sleeve of his coat, forcing him to follow her. Nero peeked from his shelter, eyeing them both curiously. “We’ll just go buy Nero a jacket, okay?”_

_Both of them nodded eagerly._

_Dante retrieved Nero from his coat and placed him on the ground as soon as they entered the clothing store. The kid took a glance at the enormous space, filled with clothes of all colours, sizes and materials and scooted a little closer to Dante’s legs, earning himself a soft chuckle and a nudge to the side._

_“Let’s race to the jackets, huh?”_

_Nero looked around once again, somewhat uncertainly, but then took off without a warning, leaving Dante scrambling to his feet, muttering a quiet ‘’lil son of a…’ under his nose._

_“Your husband’s a little reckless, isn’t he?” Lady turned to see an elderly woman standing next to her, looking at Nero and Dante with furrowed brows, a condescending tone to her voice. “It’s freezing today, your son’s bound to catch a cold…”_

_Lady was just about to snap at the woman to mind her own business, but then she noticed a genuine worry written on her face and decided she might as well be polite for once._

_“He’s not my husband, he’s my…” she hesitated a little, “he’s my friend. And that’s not his kid anyway, just his nephew. He’s taking care of him while his parents are out of town, and he’s… well, he’s doing his best.”_

_The woman shook her head, a small smile playing on her lips, and Lady chuckled._

_“Yeah, his best is not all that good.”_

_“Oh, but he seems like a decent lad,” she looked at Lady with a warm gleam in her eyes, “it’s just that he could use some help.”_

_Lady cleared her throat and struggled for an answer, but the woman has already turned to leave, and then she heard Dante calling her from across the shop._

_“LADY, LOOK AT THIS SHIT!”)_

She smiles softly at the jacket and folds it neatly.

Later, it turned out that Dante was right, demons don’t get cold. They just need to grow up a little, and then they have no use for their cute, winter clothing anymore.

“Hey, Dante, look what I’ve…” she turns to him and freezes.

Dante’s crouched in front of his box, his eyes fixed on a small, black blanket he’s holding in one hand, while the other is curled into a tight fist, dark blood dripping from his fingers.

Lady slowly worms herself closer, touching his forearm as gently as she can.

“Dante?”

He snaps out of whatever it is that possessed him, dropping the blanket and opening his hand.

“Shit,” he mumbles, trying to force his own claws to stop digging into his palm with a quiet chuckle, “I can’t fuckin’ believe I did it again.”

Lady still doesn’t pull away.

“You’re okay?”

Dante shakes his head, grinning reassuringly.

“Yeah, it‘s just… It happens sometimes.” He shrugs. “It’ll patch up in a sec.”

Lady nods reluctantly and looks over to the blanket, the only thing Nero had when Dante first brought him to the shop.

Sometimes, the internet decides to throw Lady something mildly unexpected, like, a clip with a dancing parrot, or a video with a really cuddly kitten (and even if every single time it happens, Lady goes down the endless pit of unbearably cute animals, it’s her business, nobody else’s). One of such things was this adorable footage of a sea otter being totally overprotective with its tiny, little, sea otter pup, and damn, if this otter wasn’t Dante’s spirit animal when Nero arrived at the Devil May Cry. Lady can still remember, how in the beginning he seemed to have troubles ever letting go of the kid; these are the first images that come to her mind when she recalls that time: Nero sitting in Dante’s lap, both of them stuffing their faces with chips and watching cartoons, splayed out on the top of his chest while Dante’s napping in his chair, curled up into a tight ball under his coat when going to the grocery store, propped on his shoulder during Dante’s pathetic attempts at making dinner, clutching onto his arm like a tiny koala, while Lady’s trying her best to stop the blood pouring from a huge hole in his abdomen. Dante just refused to let himself part with Nero, spending a solid part of these first few years with the kid hanging on him like some weird lucky charm. And he’d flash grins about it, roll his eyes and crack jokes about how it was an ultimate proof, that Vergil was actually a chimpanzee with a very stupid hairstyle, but the fact, that Lady had to practically pry Nero away from his arms every time they were going on a job, was kind of ruining his play.

So much has changed since then, that something must have gone horribly wrong along the way, but Lady has no idea when.

She sighs tiredly.

“Dante, are you sure about…”

“I’m sure,” he says before she even has a chance to finish the question and smiles reassuringly, “look, I get that you’re not happy about it, but Nero’s fifteen and a part demon. I’ve been on my own since I was eight…”

“…and look just how well you turned out…”

“…he’ll do peachy as well, Hell, he’ll do ten times better than I did.” He snickers. “‘Sides, it’s been him taking care of my stupid ass most of the time, not the other way round.”

Lady eyes him carefully.

Dante’s her friend, but sometimes, she feels she calls him such simply for the lack of a better word. Sure, they always have each other’s back, sure, they may joke around and share pizza and rock some parties and even make out from time to time, when they’re feeling especially stupid (and it _is_ silly, it is, because demons don’t fall for girls like her and girls like her don’t fall for demons, so why do they even bother with that, again?), but it’s always just a part of what he is, and there’s always this other part that she wants to forget – the one that flashes red eyes every time something jolts him awake, that laughs a tiny bit too merrily when another headless demon body hits the ground, that sometimes breathes out smoke into the clear air. She doesn’t understand that part, nor does she want to, and she most definitely doesn’t want to get in its way, so Lady has a rule, perhaps the only one she obeys no matter what – if something about Dante seems like it’s better left alone, she leaves it alone. And whatever the fuck is going on between Nero and him sure as Hell seems like one such thing.

So she gets up, dusting off her clothes and nudges him with her foot.

\- C’mon, let’s get to work.

***

Nero huffs irritably, looking at the cartoon boxes cluttering his room and piles of things all over it, still waiting to be packed.

It’s going to take ages.

He throws himself onto bed and of course, his phone rings the second he gets comfortable; he curses, but picks up anyway.

“Nerooooo…” Patty’s voice, cheerful as ever, makes him wince and smile a little at the same time. “What are you doing?”

“Packing my things.” He toys absently with a small, plastic car he found under his desk. “Ya only called two hours ago, it’s not like much has changed ever since.”

Patty huffs irritably, and even with her being thousands of miles away, Nero can practically see her annoyed scowl.

“And I told you to stop, didn’t I? You promised that you won’t do anything stupid while I’m gone!”

“Well, I’m not _moving_ just now, all I do is _preparing_ to move, and that ain’t the same.”

“It’s stupid anyway,” Patty mumbles; there’s some music playing on her side, but it’s too quiet for Nero to recognize the song, “did you even talk to Dante?”

Nero grits his teeth.

“Yeah, I did. And guess what: he was fucking ecstatic about the idea.”

“Oh, you’re so annoying, you know that? I shouldn’t have moved in with my mom, you both just need someone to watch over you, or you get into a freaking mess the second you have a chance!”

“I’m hanging up.”

“Wait!” he hears Patty sigh tiredly, “just, try to talk to him again, okay? I mean it, Nero,” her voice in uncharacteristically serious, “I’m sure he doesn’t really want you to leave.”

Nero groans.

“Fine,” he says finally, “but the next time we go to the cinema, I pick the movie.”

“Sure!” Patty agrees, just a tad bit too eagerly, “I miss you, you know?”

“Yeah, yeah. Have fun.”

The phone goes silent and Nero stares at the ceiling for a few seconds, before getting up with a sigh. A piece of paper falls from a small pile of stuff next to him; when he picks it up, he sees a photograph of his grandparents, the only one he’s ever had and he feels his stomach churning.

Family’s never been Dante’s favourite topic (though perhaps it was more about him not really caring about it); when Nero got a little too curious after going to school and noticing, that other kids usually have more than one relative, Dante eventually told him that yeah, Nero too had a grandmother, once, he even had a grandfather, and his grandfather was the Legendary Dark Knight Sparda, but unfortunately, they were both dead, and honestly, it sounded like something he’s made up just to shut Nero up (truth be told, he’s not quite sure he believes that story to this day, even if he has the photo). This uncharacteristic taciturnity was probably the reason why Nero was deeply convinced that Dante was his father until he was six years old, a misunderstanding that was only ever clarified because of this one, meaningful Father’s Day, when he tried to give him the card he’s made at school.

(He still remembers how still Dante went, when he stood before him, beaming with pride, with the glittery card in his hand and how it seemed like some big, soap – opera reveal, except that it was clearly supposed to be obvious, judging by the way Dante looked at him that moment, how cold and distant he was for days to come, of course he wasn’t his father. Nero was never supposed to be dumped into his life in the first place.)

The only thing he managed to get out of Dante was that his mother’s name was Vergil, she was Dante’s twin sister and she was dead. Which, to Dante at least, closed the topic, because the dead and the living don’t really have much to do with each other, now, do they?

“She looked like me,” was his only description, “just a girl, and all in blue. Which was stupid, because she didn’t even look good in blue.”

So, that’s Nero’s family.

A dead grandmother, Trish’s look-a-like.

A dead grandfather with a monocle.

A dead mother, who didn’t look good in blue.

A non-existent father, quite possibly also dead.

And an uncle, who’s great in general, but would much rather not have Nero forced on him.

Nero sighs, turning back to his boxes. It could be worse. Sure, it could be better too, but it could be worse.

There’s no need to complain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, as you may have noticed, I've decided to go with the female Vergil for this fic. Why? I honestly don't have a good answer, because really, it wasn't something I planned xd I mean, it's just a wild thought that appeared in my brain - might be because I'm such a sucker for old fairytales, and in fairytales siblings always go in pairs of a brother and a sister, or because one of my braincells slipped while writing this and typed 'she' instead of 'he', and the rest kind of decided to go through with it, or, I don't know, I'm probably the most confused person here. So yeah, feel free to ignore this fact, because I most definitely will.


	5. The Lammergeyer Will Fly With Bones High In The Air And Then Drop Them Onto Rocks. It Will Then Eat The Smashed Bones.

Nero cracks one eye open.

The room is full of light, the sun already high up on the sky; he can hear the birds chirping on the roof and almost begins to panic, when he remembers it’s Saturday, the best frickin’ day of the week. He stretches lazily, his joints protesting with small crackles, and admires his own excellent job at placing the entirety of his life into neatly stashed boxes, and damn, considering how many things this room fitted, it is a sight to behold.

He pushes himself up off the bed and trails along the corridor, only stopping when the sound of a muffled conversation reaches him halfway down the stairs.

“… he says they’ve been asking about a hunter. There’s got to be some connection…” Morrison’s raspy voice is cool as ever, but Nero can sense some strain to it, and it makes his skin crawl, because, shit, it’s Morrison, the guy who would probably inform them about the Judgement Day like it was some mildly unfortunate weather condition.

“Yeah, I guess,” Dante chirps flippantly, “so what? I’ll deal with it, ain’t nothing so bad…”

“Dante, if these people sense there’s something wrong…”

The floor creaks under Nero’s foot, and the broker goes silent; Nero decides to continue his descent, trying to make it seem as natural, as possible. He enters the office with a yawn, looking at both men with bleary eyes.

“Good to see you, son,” Morrison pushes himself away from the desk, “I heard you’ll be leaving us soon?”

Nero opens his mouth, but Dante’s faster.

“Just two more weeks and my little boy’s gonna be all grown and on his own.” He grins at Morrison’s disapproving face. “What? It’s all his idea.”

Nero rolls his eyes.

“Yeah, I’m packed already.”

Dante’s smile grows even wider, his eyes still trained on Morrison.

“Oh, are you now?”

Nero nods and plops onto the couch, reaching for the remote. Morrison sighs.

“It’s a shame.” He puts on his hat. “I’ve got a feeling that waking your uncle up is going to once again become the most challenging part of every single job I bring him.”

“C’mon, I’ll have to make up for all the naps I’ve missed. Kids are expensive as shit, ya know?”

Morrison, the proud father of two daughters, just raises one eyebrow at Dante.

“I’ll come by as soon as I know anything more. Gentlemen,” he tips his hat to them and leaves, the heated air floating into the shop as soon, as he opens the door.

Nero looks over to Dante.

“What did he want?”

“Brought me a job,” he kicks himself up from his chair and straps on Ebony and Ivory, “think I’ll just get it over with now.”

“Cool, I’ll go with ya.” Nero makes a beeline for the storeroom, but Dante stops him with a hand on his shoulder about halfway there.

“Woah, hold it, cowboy. Ya ain’t coming.”

Nero stares at him, exasperated.

“Ya promised you’ll be taking me to all the jobs, remember?”

“And I’ve been takin’ you, haven’t I? Just don’t want ya on this one.”

“Why not?”

“Because.” Dante tries to get past Nero, but he’s effectively blocking the way, his arms crossed on his chest.

“Is it about the olives on pizza yesterday? Because that’s so not my fault.”

“No.”

“That Kaina last week?”

“No.”

“Lady’s comin’ with ya?”

“No.”

Nero rubs his nose in frustration.

“Is it gonna be tough?”

“Kinda.”

“Then I’m coming.” He sets off to the storeroom yet again, but Dante grabs him by the collar.

“Ya ain’t. Going.”

Nero sneers, anger building up in his chest.

“Why the fuck not?”

“Because I don’t want you there with me, that’s why.”

“But…”

“For fuck’s sake, kid, which part of ‘I don’t want you to come’ is so hard for ya to grasp?”

“The one in which you won’t just tell me why!”

Dante lets go of Nero’s shirt, pushing him away so hard, he staggers, nearly losing his balance.

“Because you’re always getting in my way,” his eyes are narrowed, the air between them crackling dangerously, “because you’re such a deadweight, and I’m fucking fed up with babysitting ya all the damn time, how ‘bout that.”

The only thing stopping Nero from throwing himself at Dante is his own self – preservation instinct, that keeps screaming at him, that Dante’s like, seconds from ripping his throat apart and no, it doesn’t, it doesn’t hurt _at all_ , it’s actually _fuckin’ peachy_.

“Great,” he seethes, “that’s fuckin’ great. Thank you.” He strides to the door and grabs the handle so hard, he can feel the metal deform in his trembling hand. “Know what, I’ll just leave today, wouldn’t want to prolong your suffering.” He turns to see Dante still fuming in the middle of the shop, flames licking his fingers. “Don’t ya worry, you’ll never have to deal with me again.”

He can see Dante’s eyes going wide, but he just slams the doors shut behind him and stomps down the street, something unpleasant twisting underneath his skin.

It doesn’t, doesn’t, doesn’t hurt, it doesn’t hurt at all, it’s nothing he hasn’t known before, the fucking bastard wanted him to leave and he said that, never even tried to pretend otherwise.

Fine. He’ll go. It’s not like two weeks would make any difference anyway, and he’s clearly overstayed his welcome.

Plus, he won’t be here to see Dante come back from his job, which is also a good thing.

(Because there are these images he pushes to the back of his mind, like pools of blood on the floor, the stench of rotting flesh, slivers of shattered bones under heated skin, sitting by the bed for hours on end, listening to shallow, wheezy breaths and a soft, voiceless ‘don’t die, don’t die, don’t die’ escaping his own lips like a chant, because he couldn’t help it, because these were the times that he wished he could pray, but no other prayer could ever roll off his tongue; silly, silly him, but then again, he’s never been the sharpest tool in the shed, now, has he?).

Nero has no idea how many hours he’s been walking around the city before he’s calmed down enough to take a good look at his surroundings, but it must have been long; the sun’s low on the horizon and the heat’s declined substantially.

He’s wandered deep into the old magazine district, with its narrow alleys and red brick hangars enclosing him in a maze of identical turns and passages.

Great. Now he’s lost.

Just when he starts pondering the best way to the rooftops, he feels a tingling sensation crawling up his right arm. He clenches his fingers, but the feeling only gets stronger; as soon, as he turns back to the alley, an awful howl ripples through the air, and a large, dark shape jumps down from the top of one of the magazines, landing on the cobblestones right in front of Nero.

The demon is _huge_ , at least twice as tall as he is; it seems like something, that could have been a hound, once, but it’s been put into a meat grinder and then patched back together by someone, who only had a vague idea of what a dog is supposed to look like. It’s covered in white scales, looking eerily like feathers; all six legs end with shiny talons, but the middle pair is deformed, like the paws have some additional joint _somewhere_ , but Nero could never point the exact spot – they bend in an uncanny way, too much and too little at the same time, more like tentacles than limbs. The beast extends its blind head towards him, inhaling with a terrible, wheezy sound, and it bares rows and rows of teeth, a distorted growl spilling out of its throat.

Nero stares at the creature mortified for a split second, remembering the Grim, safely asleep in the storeroom.

Fuck.

He dashes into the side street, praying he’s not heading into a dead end. The beast’s short, raspy call sounds behind his back and Nero forces himself to run faster, faster, _faster_ , the fastest he’s ever run, but he only has two legs, while the demon’s got at least six, and each of them has steel-hard claws, that pound on the cobblestones with a metallic noise, closer and closer to him with each footstep, the echo of their clutter filling the dark alley, the blood red sun blinding him and promising fucking _slaughter_ , because he can’t outrun it, he just can’t

he feells the heat emanating from the distorted body on his neck, and the very next second there’s this strange, pulling sensation in his back and the sound of flesh being ripped off his own bones and it’s wet and sticky and he feels a cold, evening breeze on his naked spine.

Nero chokes on the blood, suddenly spilling out of his throat, and falls onto his knees, using the last bits of strength to roll into a small space beneath one of the buildings; he crawls away as far as he can, some hazy, detached part of his mind noticing the strange way the bricks scratch his bare ribs, as the monstrous jaws snap in the air, right where he was seconds ago. Lying still, he tries to force air into his lungs, each breath sounding wetter than the other, and oh, it’s bad, ain’t it?

He coughs, realizing with sudden sharpness, that he’s only got a few minutes before the numbness in his back recedes and damn, he’s pretty sure that being skinned alive hurts like a bitch.

A loud, crashing noise interrupts his train of thoughts. From where he’s splayed out, he can only see the demon’s paws, now almost as bloody, as the setting sun, painting the whole alley red, but when Nero feels the entire building shaking, he knows what’s about to happen.

It’s going to get him, even if it’ll have to bring the whole thing down on his head first.

His mind rushes frantically, but it doesn’t matter now, because he’s got no weapon, no fangs, no claws, no flames to aid him, he’s gonna diediedie here, like a useless, fuckin’ deadwe…

His muscles spring into action before he can even think about what he’s going to do, pure rage coursing through his veins and clouding his sight with red, launching him at the monster’s paws with all the momentum he can get. He grabs on of the claws on the flight, yanks forcefully, and when he lands under the wall on the opposite side of the alley, he’s holding one long, hooked talon in his hand. The demon lets out a ferocious cry and turns to him, its body clearly too big for the small space; it snarls with pure hatred, but fuck, if Nero doesn’t have more than enough hatred of his own. He bares his teeth at the beast, a low growl rumbling in his chest.

The beast attacks first, its paw going for Nero’s throat, so he ducks, sliding underneath it on the slippery cobblestones. He plunges the claw deep into the soft flesh of its lower abdomen and barely avoids the waterfall of black, oozing ichor that spills from the gash. The demon howls, its distorted voice sending a strange, splinting sensation through Nero’s shivering body; he can feels his bones cracking from the sound, but when he’s faced with the hungry maw, he moves quickly like a lightning bolt, jumping onto the beast’s back the second it tries to clench its jaws around him. He’s nearly out of breath, blood bubbling in his throat with every raspy inhale, but he gathers all the anger he has left and puts it into a strike right into the demon’s spine, in between the vertebrae.

The monster’s four hinder legs give up beneath it, and it collapses with another dreadful howl. Nero loses his balance and hits the ground hard, rolling away just in time to avoid being crushed by the demon’s body, desperately fighting to force some air into his lungs, but all he manages is blood, blood, _blood_ , he bends in two, trying to cough it up

the demon springs forward, its last, hopeless attempt at getting to Nero’s throat, and he’s too slow to dodge this time; rows of teeth clench around his right arm, shattering the bone, but there’s no pain, not yet – only the numb, overwhelming rage, that sets his entire body on fire. He grabs the beasts upper jaw with his left hand, sneering wildly.

"Fuck. Off." 

He snaps the maw open with enough force to tear its lower part away from the head; the demon goes limp, the black ichor gushing from its throat, as the twitching carcass finally hits the ground.

Nero falls right next to it.

Oh, it does hurt like a bitch. Like the eternal fuckin’ flames.

He wonders briefly how painful Hell is going to be and a tinge of fear passes through his mind, before he collapses into the river of dark blood.

***

The Capulet’s vibrating with the promise of a fight, so Jonathan follows, all the way to the old magazines, only to realize he came too late.

The air smells of blood, demon blood, human blood, small streams of black ichor flow down the pavement. He feels the slippery ground under his boots, the sweet, sweet taste on his tongue.

It’s nice. It hurts too, as it always does.

The enormous, malformed body of a demon is blocking the empty alley, already turning into ashes, with no will to hold it together any longer. Jonathan stares at the claws, still digging into the cobblestones, the fangs in all the wrong places, white feather-scales, tainted with poison. He cocks his head slightly.

 _Shame_.

A wet cough comes from the back of the alley. He doesn’t move for a while, watching the corpse decay before his eyes, and then, somewhat reluctantly, follows the sound.

Nero. Broken. Bloodied. Breathing.

_Oh, such a shame._

Jonathan kneels next to him, hearing for the weak heartbeat, the dark blood staining his jeans.

_Won’t make it._

He nods to himself. No, he won’t make it.

Unless he’s taken home.

Jonathan lifts up the broken body from the ground, its weight surprisingly small in his arms, a dying heartbeat right next to his chest, and he starts walking, clenching his jaws so hard, they feel like they’re going to crack.

_Broken bones, fragile bones, a piece of breathing, shivering meat in his hands, what do we do with meat?_

His sister’s not here to remind him what he doesn’t have to be, but there is pain, there’s always pain, and he can hold on to it, he can listen to it, the burning marks on his back.

_Warrior._

_Protector._

_Saviour._

_Servant._

_Of._

There it is, a word, a name, a lie, a blazing star etched onto his skin, _what do we, what do we, what do we do with meat?_

He bites his lip, until he feels the taste of blood on his tongue, sour and ashy, forces his own hands to hold the limp, unconscious body gently enough not to crush another bone. Nero takes in a wheezy breath.

“Don’t die,” Jonathan whispers, “just don’t die. Death is not very kind to demons, don’t let her trick you.”

The city is full of laughter, of the glasses clinking, of music playing, of the happiness of a warm, summer night, when people forget whatever sadness slumbers in their hearts for a blink of an eye, so Jonathan sticks to the dark alleys until he finally reaches the shop and enters without knocking, stopping right on the doorstep.

Dante’s splayed out on the couch and he’s drunk, drunk enough not to comprehend what’s happening at first, but then something like understanding flickers through his face and shadows grow in the room as he pushes himself up, a low growl vibrating in the air. Jonathan feels his own illusion shattering, revealing the black pits of his eyes, the churning in his stomach turning into this all too familiar hunger, bile at the back of his throat and tiny needles under his skin, and he wants to, he wants to, _he wants_

_nonono, I’m not here to…_

“It wasn’t me,” he blurts, the last second that he’s still able to say anything, “it wasn’t me, I swear.”

Dante just scoffs, his irises flashing red, and Jonathan feels a shiver running down his spine.

“Really? Because it sure as Hell looks like something you’d do,” the words are slurry, but not because of the alcohol, not entirely, “you’d mess him up as soon as you had a chance, and then drag him here to fuckin’ show off, wouldn’t ya?”

Jonathan swallows and forces himself to stand very, very still, focusing on Nero’s warm weight in his arms.

Dante’s right. And he’s not, but there’s no way for him to know that, so Jonathan will just have to explain, won’t he? It’s easy.

“It wasn’t me,” he says again, “you did right by me, I'll do right by you. It wasn't me.”

The shadows crawling across the room to his feet stop, even though the hunter still doesn’t trust him completely.

That’s good.

Jonathan realizes, that the longer he’s keeping Nero away from Dante, the less likely he is to get out of the shop in one piece.

“I’ll put him on the couch now.”

Dante nods, sitting on the edge of a low table, and Jonathan approaches him slowly, like one would a rabid animal; he backs away as soon, as Nero’s safely placed down.

“It was a hunter,” he says quietly, “looking for him. A strange one, you know? It wasn’t born a demon.” He gestures to Nero, shivering on the couch. “He’s not going to make it on his own.”

Dante simply nods again, and Jonathan realizes that he probably just can’t speak, not in any human tongue at least.

He slowly makes his way to the door, turning around on the doorstep, one last time.

Dante’s still sitting on the coffee table in front of the couch, arms wrapped tightly around himself, claws digging into his skin and blood staining his shirt, but his eyes are trained on Nero’s face, and he’s shivering so hard, he’s barely able to keep himself straight.

Jonathan frowns.

His sister would wish him to say something, but then again, she always tells him, he should think less about what she’d like him to want, and more about his actual desires.

The thing is, Jonathan really doesn’t like to think about most of his fancies.

He tries to, anyway.

“Dante.”

The hunter turns to him and he seems so, so lost, but Jonathan doesn’t know what to say and he doesn’t know if he could say anything, even if he knew.

“Don’t let it go south.”

Dante just chuckles, and Jonathan thinks he has never heard anything that would sound less like a laughter.


	6. Some Penguins Build Pebble Nests; The Parents Line The Pile Of Rocks With Soft Moss And Feathers

When Nero wakes up, he feels kind of like that time when Patty and him stole a bottle of whiskey from the cupboard and got themselves terribly wasted, only ten times worse; his muscles are so sore, they hurt even when he’s breathing, bones feel like they’ve been misplaced a couple of times and his head is throbbing with dull pain.

He opens his eyes with a groan, only to be faced with Dante’s cheeky grin.

“Hello, pretty. Did it hurt when you fell from heaven?”

Nero wants nothing more than to smack him, it’s just that his limbs are so goddamn heavy, and the pillows so comfortable, and he decides it might wait. His right arm is annoyingly itchy, but when he tries to scratch it, his fingers meet with something rough and hard; he lifts the blanket and discovers a plaster, covered in something that looks like a five-year-old’s scribbles.

“What the…”

“I’m starting to think you might be right and there really is something wrong with this arm,” Dante brings himself up and grabs Ebony and Ivory from the desk, “it just doesn’t heal, ya know? It’s hella annoying.”

Nero frowns, trying to make some sense out of it.

He remembers wandering through the magazines, after the fight he had with Dante. The setting sun. And then he remembers…

Oh.

“How long have I been here?” Nero winces at the sound of his own voice. It sure wasn’t in use for quite a while.

“Eight days,” Dante offers cheerfully, “and damn, kid, it must’ve been a real good one. Ya could’ve starred in a dog food commercial.”

Nero chuckles.

“Yeah, ya should have seen the other guy.” He rubs his temples. “That was some weird ass demon, ya know?”

Dante just shrugs, putting on his coat.

“That’s their thing, ain’t it?”

“I guess.” Nero looks to his uncle and realizes he’s already halfway to the doors. “Where ya goin’?”

“Out. You’re good, right?”

“Yeah, but…”

“Look, I’ve been scooped up in here with your unconscious body for the last week, we’re out of whiskey and there’s no more place to draw on this stupid plaster. I really need to kick back.” He winks at Nero. “Don’t ya worry, I’ll be back before ya start to miss me.”

Nero rolls his eyes.

“Like that would ever happen. I could just use some help packing all my stuff to the van, if I’m to hit the road on Saturday.”

Dante beams at him, his hand on the door handle.

“Sure thing, kiddo.” He salutes him lazily and leaves, as Nero falls back onto pillows, trying to ignore this ugly, empty feeling somewhere inside him.

He’s all grown now, that ain’t time for some childish fancies.

“‘Sides, he said he’ll be back soon,” he tells himself firmly.

***

Dante does not, in fact, come back soon. Or, at all, for that matter.

Nero calls Trish first, then Morrison. Then he calls Lady.

Then he waits for another forty-eight hours before calling her again, and when he hears the anxiety in her voice, he decides that it’s okay to be a little worried.

Capulet’s not all that big of a city, but it just might be the only settlement in the civilized world in which the number of bars is larger than the number of citizens, which makes finding Dante quite a difficult task, and it takes Lady’s and Nero’s combined forces to accomplish it. Dante’s, of course, perfectly fine, aside from being drunk as fuck, but at least they can save the bar owner from having all his alcohol supply dried up, so there’s that.

The funny thing about Dante is the fact, that the drunker he is, the more clingy he gets; when they find him, he’s basically beginning to develop his own gravity, latching himself onto Nero like a gigantic barnacle as soon, as he gets within his reach (though considering just how outrageously _huge_ he is, it’s more like Nero is the barnacle, attacked by an extremally affectionate Titanic). With Lady’s substantial help, they somehow manage to drag him across the town and back to the shop, effectively preventing most of his gleeful attempts at cuddling with innocent bystanders, buildings, lampposts and paving slabs, though by the end of it, they’re both completely out of breath and more exhausted, than if they just ran a marathon.

After the last one, uneven fight with the stairs, they finally dump him onto his bed and Lady pushes her wet hair away from her eyes.

“Are you sure he’s okay?”

Nero gestures towards giggling Dante, who’s now probably trying to take off his shoes, though judging by the way things are progressing, he’s more likely to summon some unsuspecting Prince of Hell than to actually complete the task.

“He’s clearly havin’ the time of his life.”

Lady just rolls her eyes.

“It’s Dante. I’ve seen him literally picking up his own guts from the ground and he was still laughing, it’s kind of an involuntary reaction.”

“He’s peachy, I’m telling ya. The hangover might kill him, tho. Or I will,” Nero adds cheerfully, “either way, it’s gonna be painful.” Seeing how Lady still seems to be unconvinced, Nero sighs, leaning against the doorframe. “It’s fine, really, I’m sorry I even bothered ya.”

“Don’t be,” Lady squeezes his shoulder reassuringly, “even if Dante’s a jackass, it doesn’t mean it’s not okay to be worried about him. I was, you know.” She smiles and waves her goodbye.

Nero sighs, running a hand through his hair.

Yeah, he was worried, his naïve stupidity in its prime yet again, as if Dante hasn’t disappeared for entire days before.

As if he learned nothing throughout the nearly whole fifteen years of his life.

He brings himself to turn back to the bed, only to find Dante already passed out, his boots miraculously off his feet.

Nero throws a blanket over him (damn, having to use only one hand is annoying) and sneaks out of the room, closing the doors behind with a quiet click. He grabs his phone and hesitates for a second, his fingers hovering above the screen.

There’s no point putting it off, huh?

He picks up a number and waits a few signals.

“Jonathan? Yeah, I could use some help.”

***

“That’s all?”

Nero takes one final look at piles of boxes, now filling nearly the entire space of the van, and nods contently.

“Yup.” He leans against the side of the car and looks over to Jonathan. “Ya want something to drink?”

“Sure, why not.”

Nero goes back into the shop and re-emerges with two cans of cold coke, taking a sit on the stairs next to Jonathan. They sip their drinks in silence for a while, the only sounds being the sparkling bubbles and the occasional cawing of crows, bickering on the rooftop of the shop. Nero cranes his neck to look at them.

One, two, three, four… ten. He smiles softly.

“So,” Jonathan starts, and Nero nearly jumps in surprise, “where will you head on to?”

Nero shrugs.

“West, I think. West’s always the way to go.”

Jonathan nods, a small smirk playing on his lips.

“So I’ve heard.”

Nero crushes an empty can in his hand.

“I’ll better hit the road. Thanks for the help, by the way.”

“Nah, don’t mention it.”

Nero’s just about to hop onto his seat, when his phone rings; reluctantly, he fetches it out of the depths of his pocket and picks up, without looking at the screen.

“NERO ANGELO ALIGHIERI, YOU WILL NOT MAKE ANOTHER MOVE.”

Nero freezes, Patty’s voice echoing in the empty alley. He looks over to Jonathan, panic written all over his face, but he just lifts one eyebrow.

“Let me tell you, when they start using your full name, you better listen.”

“FOR ONCE SOME WISDOM LEFT YOUR MOUTH, JONATHAN. GOOD FOR YOU.”

“Patty, what the Hell…”

“Oh, what the Hell, exactly,” she snaps, each word dripping with pure fury, “you promised me, Nero. You promised, you won’t do anything stupid while I’m gone!”

Nero feels his initial panic leaving him, replaced by red hot anger.

“It ain’t nothin’ stupid Patty, I’ve told you that like, a hundred times…”

But Patty’s having none of it.

“IT IS THE SINGLE MOST IDIOTIC THING YOU HAVE EVER TRIED TO DO,” the high – pitched scream rings in Nero’s ears, and he can see Jonathan wincing beside him. “Seriously, Nero, how on earth is it, that everyone but you can see Dante doesn’t want you to leave?”

“It’s more like everyone but _you_ can see that he _does_ …”

“Oh, really?” there’s enough acid in her voice to melt the Rebellion herself. “Ask Jonathan, he’ll tell you I’m right.”

“Hey, I told you he wanted to leave, my job ends here…”

“You did WHAT?”

“SHUT. UP!” Patty takes a deep breath. “Nero. Dante’s not kicking you out.”

“But–”

“He does not wish you were gone,” Patty raises her voice, ignoring Nero completely, “he will not be happier if you leave. Why can’t you just trust me, if you have too thick of a skull to see that for yourself?”

“But he said–“

“Dante talks a lot when he’s not thinking, and he thinks a lot when he’s not talking, he can’t do both at once, you big dummie. He doesn’t mean half of the things he says, and the other half just makes no sense.”

Nero goes silent.

“Also, I swear, if you leave Devil May Cry, I’ll make Jonathan find you and kick your ass no matter where you run off to.” Someone calls Patty’s name on her side and she sighs. “I have to go now, so you better behave.”

And just like that, she hangs up, leaving Nero in a state of utter bewilderment.

Jonathan clears his throat.

“You know she’ll actually make me do that, right?”

“Honestly? I’d rather you just kicked my ass right now. Fatally.”

Jonathan looks like someone faced with an issue far beyond his area of competence. Nero shakes his head, but it still doesn’t make any sense.

“Do you really think he doesn’t want me to leave?”

Jonathan shrugs, leaning against the van next to Nero.

“Well, yeah.”

“Then why didn’t he just tell me? Why is he acting like he wants me out? Why won’t he just…”

“And why won’t you just ask him if he actually wants you to go?”

Nero closes his mouth and Jonathan sighs.

“Has it ever occured to you, that Dante might actually not have been particularly happy before he found out about you?”

Nero frowns.

“Well, to me it’s kind of like the less people bother him, the happier he is, so no, Jonathan, I've never had that impression.”

“Really? I mean, do you honestly think sleeping through the entire days and drinking yourself into coma are the best ways to enjoy the life? Because according to everyone who knew him back then, that’s pretty much all he was doing when there weren’t any demons around to kill. Sleeping and drinking.” Jonathan runs a hand through his hair and huffs in frustration. “What exactly did he tell you about your family?”

Nero shrugs.

“Not much. Just that they’re dead.”

“And you think that didn’t do a number on him? I mean, I’m not saying Dante’s the most sensitive creature out there, but I’m pretty sure, that if he’s human enough to care about this stupid polypody he keeps on his desk, then losing his entire family over and over again might have been a little upsetting. So, here’s how I see it: when you appeared out of nowhere and waltzed onto the stage, all cotton candy, baby blue and teddy bears, Dante freaked out, because one, he was barely capable of keeping alive one person, and that was himself, two, he had absolutely no idea how to take care of a kid and three, for all he knew, you were either gonna choke on a biscuit and die, or like, crawl away as far as possible the second you were given a chance, and it was the one thing in the world he feared the most, because you were the only family he had left, and if he screwed it up, there would be no more second chances. But he screwed up once and you stayed, twice and you stayed, thrice and damn, you were still there, and he was just starting to think that it might work out somehow, when Patty moved in with her mother, and Dante realized, that the second you saw how cool having a normal parent is, you’d totally just get up and leave for good. And guess what? That’s exactly what you did.”

“But that just makes no sense!” Nero huffs, “I mean, he’s been having the time of his life ever since I told him that I want to move out of the shop…”

“Oh, has he now? Just like you’re so happy about it? Because for me it’s just that you go faking it and he goes faking it and you’re both running in bloody circles, like headless fucking chickens.” He sits back on the stairs and grabs his coke.

Nero moves slowly to sit next to him.

"Just for the record, I don’t actually think you're right, but if you were, I’d be pretty pissed off. I mean, for fucks sake, if I've managed to fit my entire room into this van for nothing, just because Dante refuses to communicate like a normal person, I’m gonna kick his ass.”

“Oh, please, like you’re such a great talker, and you’re what, a quarter of a demon, maybe? Dante probably doesn’t even know how to name half of the things he feels, that kind of precludes any sappy speeches he could possibly come up with to make you stay.”

Nero shoots him a sideways glance.

“Ya know, for a guy who has like, two emotions, you’re surprisingly good at them.”

Jonathan scoffs.

“You don’t need to understand the general concept of time to be a really decent watchmaker.”

“Fair enough.” He picks at the plaster absently. “The Hell am I supposed to do now?”

“I’m probably the last person in the world you should be asking for advice, you know that?”

“Well, yeah, but I don’t really have much of a choice.”

Jonathan sighs, strands of white hair falling into his eyes.

“I’m not… I’m not very good at being anything more than a demon, you see?” His voice is quiet, so quiet it almost doesn’t sound like his throat is full of shattered glass. “So, here’s what my sister once told me: if you suck at being human, sometimes it’s okay to just not act like one.”

Nero chews on it for a few seconds.

“She right about that?”

Jonathan smiles fondly.

“Oh, she always is.” He glances at Nero. “You’re going, or what?”

Nero shakes his head slowly.

“Nah, I think I’ll just… I’ll stay ‘till Patty’s back at least.”

“How wise of you.”

Silence stretches before them, even the crows are gone now.

“Ya really think what ya said before?”

“Yeah, I do.”

Nero brings his knees closer to him, resting his chin on the top of them.

“I wish you were right, you know?”

Jonathan just nods and they sit there together, watching the sun disappear behind the rooftops.

***

It’s not a good night.

It might be about the heat, that just refuses to let go. Might be about the starless sky, about the distinct smell of rain and ozone in the air, about the electricity crackling on Nero’s skin. Might be about this feeling, like something is about to happen, that just keeps him awake, hour after hour, listening to Dante tossing and turning in his bed.

It’s just not a good night.

Nero sighs, turning onto his back.

He should have left, shouldn’t he? The sole fact, that Jonathan and Patty are so sure it’s a bad idea should be a reason enough to tell him otherwise, because, seriously, when did they become such experts on interpersonal relationships?

Oh, that’s right. They didn’t. It’s just that they said exactly what Nero wanted to hear, because no matter how hard he tries to convince everyone, including himself, that he’s fine and he’s all grown, and he’ll do great on his own, there’s still this silly, naïve whelp in him, that wants to be safe and protected and _wanted_ , or not _unwanted_ at least, and it’s so pathetic, it makes his skin crawl.

Fuck, he’s pitiful.

A small whine comes from Dante’s room, and Nero sits up, hesitant.

When he was very little, Nero’s always slept with Dante, curled up on his chest like a kitten, or pressed to his side, or clutching onto his arm – it seemed like the most natural thing in the world back then, when it was all so simple, because Dante was warm and safe and the beating of his heart was the single most comforting sound Nero’s ever heard. It’s one of his earliest memories, falling asleep to the sound of this heartbeat and a quiet, quiet lullaby, so soft, he could only hear it with his ear against Dante’s chest.

Nero knew that Dante had nightmares sometimes – he’d toss in his sleep, mumbling something Nero couldn’t understand, and it was fine, Nero had nightmares too, every now and then, so he’d just scoot closer to him, or shake him awake, if the dream seemed to be especially bad. There was nothing more to it, not until that one time, when Dante woke up screaming, his eyes blood red, when he held onto Nero so hard, he felt as if his ribs were going to give up eventually, as he sat there for what seemed like hours, murmuring softly in his arms and doing his best to calm him down, until Dante stopped shivering and carried Nero to the kitchen, where they made pizza, the rising sun filling the room with golden light.

Ever since then, Nero slept in his own bed; sometimes, he could still hear Dante tossing and mumbling in his sleep, and part of him wanted nothing more than to go to his room and help, but he never dared to – he was not wanted there, he knew that, so he’d just shut his eyes close, put a pillow over his head and ignore this urge, until it became nothing, but a gentle whisper at the back of his mind.

It’s back now, for some reason, and when he hears another whimper, Nero gets up from the bed and shuffles down the corridor.

Dante’s asleep, shivering slightly, his breathing shallow and quick and there’s scent of blood in the air. Nero moves closer and sits on the bed gingerly.

“Dante?”

The only answer’s a pained whine, as Dante shudders violently. Nero reaches out to shake him lightly.

“Dante, c’mon, wake–“

He jolts awake, grasping Nero’s arm so hard, he hisses in pain, only now noticing bloodied claws and long gashes, mending themselves before his eyes. Dante breathes hard, staring at him with wide, hollow eyes.

“Fuck,” it’s barely a whisper, rough and confused, “you’re... still here.”

Nero scoffs bitterly.

“Yeah, I’m going,” he mutters, “ya had a nightmare, so I thought I’d just wake ya up before I leave, I’m going now, don’t ya worry.”

He moves to get off the bed, but Dante doesn’t let go, tightening his grip on Nero’s wrist; his fingers tremble slightly, like he’s trying to unclench them, but can’t for some reason. Nero sighs tiredly and sits back next to him.

“’S just a dream, Dante, it’s not real. Come now, just lemme go and I’ll be off.”

Dante shakes his head, still holding Nero in place.

“Don’t… don’t be,” he mumbles, “I don’t…” he growls in frustration, as if he cannot get his own words to obey him, dark ember glistening in his eyes and he’s watching Nero like he wants him to understand something, and it’s _fucking ridiculous_ , because Dante makes no sense on his best days, and yet Nero’s still here, trying to figure him out in the middle of a really freakish night. A wave of exhaustion washes over him; he’s just so damn _tired_ of trying to talk to Dante, of trying to get him to listen, of having so many words between them and of never having enough words at the same time, and he just wants to have some fuckin’ rest, but of course, just when he’s finally made up his mind, when he’s all ready to leave, Dante _just won’t let him go_.

He turns away from him, gritting his teeth so hard, he feels them crackle dangerously.

“What the fuck do you want?”

There’s no answer, of course, because when has he ever gotten an answer out of–

Dante pulls him closer, clutching onto him like he’s the only thing in the world that could keep him grounded, like he’s the only thing that could stop him from falling down into the gaping pit of Hell, and it’s scary, it’s scary as fuck, and it’s really not at the same time, Nero’s way too old to be held like that and yet he feels so perfectly safe, and this crippled piece of human in him just can’t comprehend it all, it’s just too much, it’s too tangled, it’s too messed up, it doesn’t make any sense and

_it’s okay, it’s okay not to_

it’s safe, it’s warm, it’s good, it smells like family, like protection, like home; claws to protect him, wings to shelter him

curl up into warm, curl up into safe, take a deep breath

“Don’t go,” he hears, “please, don’t go.”

A weird sound, Nero thinks at first, until he remembers how to understand words and a frown forms on his face.

No, he won’t go. Why would he?

He can’t quite force his own tongue to comply, so he just nods. Words are a human thing anyway; birds and demons don’t need to ask for directions to know the way back to their nests.

A low thunder rumbles outside, but it doesn’t matter much anymore; come Hell or highwater, or even the King of the Wild Hunt with his entire suite, nothing could reach them right now. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so we've come to the end :D Honestly, I didn't expect to have such a blast writing this fic, but damn, it was so fun, I'm pretty sure I'm gonna jump into a sequel after I'm done dealing with a couple of other projects (which will be sometime after the New Year, I guess?)
> 
> Anyways, thank you all very much for kudos and comments, and I do sincerely hope you had at least a tiny bit of a good time reading this little story, because hey, while I didn't think anyone would actually like it, it's still always such a great pleasure for me, to do something for others to enjoy :D


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